Golden Gate Park was one of those places everyone puts on their list to visit—and quite frankly, it wasn’t without reason.
The atmosphere was bustling and packed full of history completely unique to San Fran, and the microclimate was a thing within itself. It wasn’t that close to Lola or me, but as I pulled into the parking lot in my hardly ever used Corolla, I knew exactly why she’d chosen it.
We’d come there more than once to people watch and talk, and the Conservatory of Flowers was one of her favorite places inside its confines. She hadn’t said, but I knew that was where she would be.
I opened my trunk and took out the box with one of the weirdest gifts I’d ever gotten for someone and clutched it to my chest.
I was feeling a lot of things I wasn’t accustomed to—nerves, hope, and a threatening cloud of disappointment nearly as thick as the fog I knew would be here first thing tomorrow morning.
What would I do if we couldn’t find the words to understand each other?
I honestly wasn’t sure.
But I knew I couldn’t go back to the person I was before—at least not entirely.
Because Lola Sexton had done a real fucking bang-up job of teaching me it really was possible to walk through life not knowing you’re missing a goddamn thing—until the minute you find it.
Lola sat on a bench facing away from me, toward the flowers and steps in front of the greenhouse as I approached. It hadn’t taken me any time at all to find her in the crowd, hair now down in a curtain around her face. Gray Converse covered her feet in place of her roller skates, but she didn’t look any less interesting. Just like I’d known from the beginning—she stood out. And something about her called to me.
My unicorn.
A group of pigeons gathered at her feet, and I had to laugh at the perfect little picture fate had painted us.
I sat down carefully on the bench next to her and laid the box on top of my thighs. Two minutes passed without either of us saying anything.
Finally, Lola had enough. “Possibly two of the fucking chattiest people on the planet, and neither of us has anything to say?”
“I’ve got a lot to say, Lo.”
She shifted toward me and flapped out her hands. “Then say it.”
I gave a little laugh and smiled. But man, it didn’t feel all that happy. So much was riding on this conversation, and I knew neither of us could keep living in this limbo of torture much longer. We were either going to work things out or we weren’t, but this was probably the last chance. “I was just happy to be sitting next to you,” I told her honestly, the ache so deep from missing her, it had settled into my bones.
She looked away quickly, like she wasn’t expecting it, and sucked in a huge gulp of air.
“Why’d you pick this place?” I asked and she shrugged.
“It seemed appropriate.”
“Appropriate?” I didn’t understand.
“Appropriate,” she confirmed. “I feel like the ending scene in movies always happens in some pivotal location where they can take aerial shots of the whole thing. And I didn’t think they could fit a helicopter in either one of our apartments.”
I smiled again, and this time, I felt it in places other than my face. Lola had been picturing our happy ending.
“Yeah. You’re right. Pretty sure I’d have needed the two-bedroom.”
“Why are we here?” she asked, and in that moment, it was simple. All of the complication and expectation fell away, and all that was left was love. My love for her, and hers for me.
“Because you and I are better together.”
She sighed, and I wasn’t sure if she didn’t believe me or wanted something different, but I didn’t care. I wasn’t leaving here without her.
Turning to face her directly, I put two fingers to her chin and forced her to do the same. “We are, LoLo. My life is infinitely better than what it was, now that you’re in it. You make me laugh and reconsider, and hell, you make me forget to be such a thinker and just live.”
“I need you to do things—”
“And I plan to do them,” I promised. I didn’t care what they were. “Pencil them in on my calendar.”
Her eyes narrowed. “You don’t have a calendar. Are you kidding me?”
“I’ll get one,” I teased. “It’ll have your picture on the front, and hey, maybe a naked picture of you on each month.”
She shoved me hard enough that the box fell off my legs, and I laughed. “Hey, watch it. You’re going to ruin your present.”
“Present?” Her whole demeanor perked up, and I was hit with the memory of mindlessly walking the streets of Chinatown hand in hand with Lola. It’d been a fun afternoon, perusing trinkets inside the various gift shops. And once she’d set her sights on this obscure little porcelain cat, she had been fixated. Lola had loved that kitschy little souvenir, and since I loved her, I’d purchased it on a whim when she wasn’t paying attention.
The present would’ve been inconsequential to anyone else. But not Lola. She’d been so damn excited, bouncing around and screeching her happiness like an adorable little ball of quirky.
I took in her curious eyes, and my heart made itself known with each pounding thump thump thump inside my chest. I needed her. I wanted her. I loved her more than I’d ever loved anything in my life.
Her eyes glanced down at the box and then back up at me. She was all but vibrating with impatience to know what was hidden inside.
“Do you want to open it?” I smiled, and there was no denying my heart was honestly in my eyes. It belonged to her.
She searched my face, and I saw the instant realization set in. She shook her head in an attempt to regain her composure—and her distance. “Reed—”
I wasn’t ready for her to get either of them back. “Just open it,” I interrupted. “I’m pretty sure it’ll answer all those questions swirling in your eyes, and I won’t even have to strain my voice.”
Swiping the box from my lap, she pulled off the lid and gasped.
“Oh, my God!”
I didn’t know what she’d been expecting, but I was ninety-nine percent positive it wasn’t that.
“Yep,” I confirmed.
“Oh, my God!” she shrieked again.
“Yep,” I repeated through a laugh.
“It’s—”
“Us.”
“A really fucking creepy version,” she muttered. You couldn’t have melted the smile off of my face with a microwave.
“I know. Aren’t they great?”
She stared down at them, shock turning to wistfulness, but everything else about her was frustratingly quiet. “Lo?”
“You got us marionette puppets,” she whispered roughly.
“I did.”
“Of us.”
I nodded. “Uh-huh.”
“At eighty years old.”
“That’s right.”
“Oh, my God.”
I pulled the old man puppet version of me out of the box and handed it to her. “Now, I know your dream was to have one of yourself, and you still can if that’s what you decide…”
“But?”
“But I think this is better.” I shrugged and spoke around the emotion clogging my throat. “My strings are yours to pull, Lo.”
Her hand went to her mouth, but I pulled it away and linked it with mine, trapping the other one against her thigh with the weight of my own. “I should have gone with you to Santa Cruz. I should have really listened when you asked, and I should have known that when it comes to you and me, none of the rules I’d created for myself on my own would apply. New us, new rules.”
“Reed,” she whispered, and the way she said it filled me with everything I needed to know I’d done it. I’d broken through the barrier I’d made with stupidity, and I had no plans to ever build it back.
“I thought I knew best, but as it turns out, Sex really does say.”
She melted at the mention of my unused column. “I loved the column.”
I shrugged. I didn’t care about the column, but I did care about her. “I love you.”
Her lips hit mine, and I had just leaned in to enjoy it when she pulled away, grabbed both puppets, and ran up to stand on the brick wall overlooking the flowers.
I stood and watched her.
“Come here,” she demanded with a gesture of both full arms and a jerk of her head.
“I’m good right here,” I told her with a smile, settling into my spot and crossing my arms over my chest.
“You’re so weird sometimes,” she called back, and I laughed.
That was really rich coming from her. My weirdo.
“Come up here and look at the fucking view.”
“I am,” I replied.
She tilted her head in annoyance.
I was actually surprised she didn’t get it. But I was more than willing to tell her. “Don’t you know, Lo? The best view includes you.”