“Has Caleb ever been to any big city?”

Meredith had been tracing her fingers along the lines of Toby’s chest when he asked the question. She wasn’t sure how they were going to both fit on the couch when he suggested they lie down, but things worked out easily with her on top of him. She stopped her fingers from their path and looked up to his face to see if she could pick up any reasoning behind the question.

His eyes were blank, the way he liked to keep them during any serious conversation. Meredith thought he did it to hide what he was thinking. She decided not to let him in on the fact that it only made things more obvious.

“I’m guessing while you were getting groceries today you made some calls. How soon do you have to go back?”

The call had come sooner than Meredith had hoped, but longer than she thought it would take. Toby had been in her little slice of the universe for a month and a half. Six weeks wasn’t enough time. Grace had barely been with them a month.

Meredith pushed on Toby’s chest to sit up, but the arms around her made the task a little difficult. Relying on a single arm to keep her place, he put his free hand on her face and used his thumb to rub her cheek.

“The team’s going to buy out my contract. There was talk about me joining the front office in some capacity, but I told them my head wasn’t in it.”

“But your head has been better, right? No big headaches or anything in weeks?”

They didn’t spend every minute together. Toby went back to his place every day, so there were plenty of times he could’ve hidden one of his blackouts.

“I didn’t mean it the way you’re thinking. Surprisingly, my head’s been in good shape.”

His eyes were still mostly blank, but a smile started to reach them. Toby always seemed to have a smile on his face. It didn’t always reach his eyes, but when it did, it was hard to look away from him.

“Hmm, you didn’t answer the question on when you have to leave. I assume that’s why you were asking about Caleb’s travelling experiences.”

“I would’ve asked about Grace, but I have it on good authority that the most interesting place she’s been is the doctor’s office. I want you guys to come with me. It will only be for a week or so while I get some things settled.”

Closing her eyes, Meredith pulled back. The second time always seemed to be the charm with Toby, as he let her go without a fight. She didn’t stop with just sitting up. She hopped to her feet so she could walk around. They’d been on the couch for about an hour, so even if she didn’t need some space, the stretching alone made her feel better.

She still felt a little pudgy, but her body for the most part was back to normal. Toby tried to get her to rest as much as possible. It was a futile task on his part. She’d expected it to take a lot longer to lose the big belly, as it did with Caleb, but apparently chasing after two kids was doing wonders for her.

“And then what? Are we going to pretend that spending a few days back isn’t going to change this?”

“Why don’t you ever call it us? Every time you bring up our relationship you say this. It’s not a this, Meredith.  It’s not even just a you and me thing. It’s you, Caleb, Grace and me.”

Meredith scoffed and walked over to the door. The kids had been asleep for a while and the sun had long ago set. Most days, Toby would’ve already been gone for the night, but apparently he waited until the last minute to bring up the topic of their little vacation.

Opening the door, Meredith walked outside to get a look at the stars in the sky. She knew it drove Toby crazy when she walked away from him, but she wasn’t sure where the conversation would go. Plus, she didn’t want to wake the kids.

She didn’t have to turn around to know Toby was right behind her. Some days he felt like a shadow. They had a rickety old picnic table on the north side of the house that she headed towards. There were other chairs and seating options, but the table also had the best view of the clear sky.

“Don’t shut me out.”

Toby didn’t give her any space as he sat next to her. Their legs touched and he was quick to wrap his fingers around hers.

“I’m not shutting you out. I’m being realistic. How many girlfriends, ex or otherwise, will be waiting for you back in New York?”

“There is no otherwise. Since you’re having problems admitting there’s an us, I’m guessing you haven’t realized I consider you my girlfriend. I don’t sleep around, Meredith.”

Meredith shook her head and leaned back on the table so she could look at the sky. It was the reason she picked to spot, so she figured she might as well try to find whatever guidance the cosmos had for her. Lately, they’d sent her for a loop.

“Would it really qualify as sleeping around since we haven’t slept together?”

The picnic table creaked as Toby got up and moved to stand in front of Meredith. She continued to look up at the sky and picked out Orion’s Belt. She only knew a few constellations.

“Are you serious? I know how literal you take everything, but I’m not just talking about sex. I don’t fool around.”

“That doesn’t mean you won’t run into someone and send a telegram or something to let me know it’s over before you hook up with them.”

It was easy to concede Toby was honorable to do that much. Meredith wanted to believe his claims of not going anywhere, but she knew how different things were in the city. Something about the air there made people do stupid things.

“A telegram? I’m pretty sure you didn’t miss that I want you guys to come with me. I have some meetings and such, but I thought we could hit the zoo and some museums. And look,” he said as he climbed on the table next to her and hovered over her so she could see his face. “If you want complete surety that the meetings aren’t some planned rendezvous with the girlfriends you’re worried about, I’m sure I can work something out.”

“Why haven’t you gotten married and settled down? And why in the world would you pick an already-made family to try out?”

She’d wondered about his motives from the very beginning. She stopped short of asking whether he could have his own kids or had some kind of condition that didn’t allow him to have sex. Meredith thought she knew at least part of the latter question. Cuddling on the couch with him had proven a certain appendage between his legs didn’t always slumber.

Toby sighed and moved so he was sitting next to her again, instead of contorting himself to look at her face. They’d had all sorts of serious talks over the last weeks to get to know each other better, but there were still so many things they hadn’t dived into. He probably hadn’t expected that his somewhat simple question about Caleb’s travels would come back to a discussion Meredith had a feeling would reveal everything each of them had been working up the courage to talk about.

She had more than enough skeletons in her closet. If they were going to have any kind of real talk about going to the city, they were going to have to come out. Since she had to share the personal bits of her life, she was digging for something in return.

“I didn’t pick you guys out. I’ve had two serious relationships in my life, and I’m counting this as one of them. I don’t have any great tales of lessons learned or bitterness from things not working out. I’ve just never found myself ready to make any big commitments other than to my job.”

He reached over and grabbed her hand, kissing it gently before wrapping his fingers with hers. Meredith’s only weakness was her kids, but something told her Toby was trying to worm his way into that category. The thought of it scared her to death.

“You know, you talk a lot about how I’m going to hurt you someday. I hope you know that you’re the one with all the power in this relationship. I’ve been crazy about you from the moment we met, as cliché as that sounds. You’re the one who’s made roadblocks and kept me at arm’s reach.”

Meredith still thought that was for a good reason. While she’d been stuck at the doctor’s, she’d done some research, and it wasn’t hard to find pictures of Toby with beautiful women either on his arm or trying to get his attention. The man had his own fan club.

“I’m not sure any of that answered my question. It did make me think of another one, though. Are you only trying to make something work here because your career is over?”

If he was too busy to have a relationship because of hockey, then it made sense that he was just latching on to the first thing he could find. Meredith didn’t want the idea to be true, but she thought Toby had some questions he needed to ask himself.

“Why are you doing this? If I would’ve found someone that I felt even half of what I feel about you back when I could play, I would’ve made an effort. I told you that I tried once, it just didn’t work out. Since then, no one clicked until you. This has nothing to do with my career. It has everything to do with how you make me feel.”

Humming, Meredith thought about ways to segue into what she really wanted to talk about. Hearing him say over and over there was something special about her and skirt around whatever feelings he had was something they did almost every day. He never came out and said he loved her, but she knew those were the words hidden between the lines.

The bad part was, even as she at times tried to sabotage whatever was going on between them, she knew she’d already fallen in love with him. The moment she saw him with Caleb on his hip just after the baby was born was an image engrained in her heart, and she didn’t want it to disappear.

“We still know so little about each other,” she whispered.

She hadn’t meant for him to necessarily hear it, but a squeeze of her hand let her know he did. Meredith sighed as she let her head rest on his shoulder. It was best if she didn’t have to watch his face as she tried to remedy her statement.

“I can’t remember if I ever came right out and said it, but most of my life was spent in that city you want to take me back to.”

“I’m aware of that fact.”

“But something you’re not aware of, in fact no one here has ever been clued in on, not even Lawrence, is that seven years ago, I left a man figuratively standing at the altar and ran as far as I could to get away from him and my family.”

It was a story Meredith never thought she’d share with another person. Just thinking about it brought up so many emotions based in hurt and betrayal that she wanted to take a shovel and bury the story somewhere remote and deep.

Part of her trying to push Toby away was because she didn’t want to tell the story. Unlike Lawrence, if something was going to happen between the pair, Toby deserved to know. He was from New York and had family there, so he needed to know what he was getting into. Meredith didn’t keep track of the news from back home, but she imagined the initial search for her was still a cold case.