The next morning, Ben was awake before me too. I blinked groggily at him as he came into the room and set a tray down on the bedside table. Then, I yawned widely, belatedly bringing up my hand to cover my mouth. “Morning,” I said sleepily.
“Good morning,” Ben said, smiling sweetly at me. “How are you feeling?”
I stretched a little. “Really good,” I told him. “I mean, I think last night was the best night of sleep I've had in a while—it helps to not have to worry about anything.”
“Yeah, I'll bet,” Ben said.
“What about you, how did you sleep?”
“Pretty well,” Ben said, reaching out to lightly touch my cheek. “Always helps when I have a pretty girl to cuddle up to.”
I blushed a little and looked curiously over towards the tray.
“I made breakfast,” Ben explained.
I gaped at him. “So last night I passed out in the car, and this morning you were up before me for long enough that you could bring me breakfast in bed?” The guy was practically a saint.
“Yeah, you seemed like you could use the sleep this morning, same as last night. I know you love running, but sometimes I wonder if maybe you're pushing yourself too hard.”
I laughed a little. “Nah,” I said, shaking my head. “It's more just the late nights that are killing me lately. The running helps me wake up.”
Ben grinned and climbed back into bed with me, kissing me lazily. “Well, I hope you like omelettes” he said. “It's one of the few things I know how to make well.”
“Sounds great,” I said. “Honestly—you brought me breakfast in bed; I'm not going to complain no matter what it is.”
Ben laughed and grabbed the tray, balancing it over both of our laps and beginning to remove the lids off the dishes. Sure enough, he had brought each of us a delicious-looking garden omelette, some plain yogurt with a swirl of honey, and a small dish of fresh berries. Plus there was coffee.
“Oh my god, a guy that brought me coffee in bed,” I said, putting a hand over my heart. “I swear, I'll love you until the day I die.” Then, I realized what I said and pinked a little, putting a hand over my mouth. “I mean—I mean, not that I don't love you—I mean, I don't mean that I love you. Not that loving you would be a bad thing, just… I don't think we're...to that point yet. Maybe we never will be. I just mean-”
“It's quite all right,” Ben said, looking amused. “I understand what you mean; you don't have to qualify it.”
I ducked my head a little. “Yeah...” Before I could say anything else stupid, I took a bite of omelette. “Oh!” I said in surprise. “Wow, this is actually really good.”
“You didn't expect it to be?” Ben asked, raising an eyebrow at me. “I think I mentioned at one point that my mother's Italian? I grew up learning how to cook. Well, when I wasn't away at school, that is.”
I shook my head, not even sure where to start with that one. “You mentioned it,” I finally said. “But I guess I hadn't really...thought about it. So you must be really good at pasta dishes, right?”
“And pizza,” Ben agreed. “But really, once you have the basics of cooking down, everything is pretty much the same process. You just have to be able to think through what you want things to taste like.”
I shook my head. “I should warn you now, I'm a terrible cook. My mother always reminds me that I'll make a terrible housewife, when the time actually comes for that.”
Ben shrugged. “To be honest, I'm not really looking for the typical housewife,” he said. He gave me a wicked smile. “I'm not sure I'm looking for a wife at all!”
I blinked at him and then shook my head. Now wasn't really the time to have a conversation like that, but suddenly I started wondering whether coming away with him for the weekend might not have been a mistake. There were so many discussions that we should have had before we started…committing to this. And that's what it felt like this weekend was: it felt like this was a commitment to something. To an 'us'. If we weren't looking for the same basic things…
“Hey, hey,” Ben said, looking worried. He slung an arm around my shoulders. “Sorry, that was a joke—but not a good one. I absolutely am looking for someone to marry—eventually. It doesn't have to be tomorrow or even next year, but at some point… Yeah.” He trailed off, awkwardly rubbing the back of his neck with his other hand.
I picked at my food. “Sorry,” I said, feeling as though I'd just dragged down the fun, lighthearted mood of the morning. “I don't mean to make things so...serious. I just… I guess I still don't really know what you're looking for with me.”
“You're my girlfriend,” Ben reminded me, as though that meant something.
“Yeah, I know that,” I said. “But I mean...” I waved a hand vaguely, not expecting him to understand.
But Ben was nodding sagely. “Eventually—and I mean it when I say that I don't really have a timeline on this stuff, although I'm not ruling out that it would happen sooner, rather than later… Eventually, I would like to have a wife and maybe a couple children who could inherit the family business—if they wanted to, of course; I wouldn't force them into something that they weren't interested in. I'd like to do more travel as well, though. I'm thinking of maybe going away for a couple months this summer. If you were interested, maybe you could join me for at least part of that time...” He trailed off.
“I'm sorry, I didn't mean to have a conversation like this over breakfast,” I said, even though inside, I could feel my heart starting to beat with excitement. If he was already looking ahead to the summer and thinking that maybe I could join him traveling, he had to be pretty serious about this, right?
“Yeah, me neither—and I think I'm the one who opened that whole mess, so don't you start apologizing!” Ben said. He held up a blueberry as though it were a sort of peace offering, and I automatically opened my mouth to take it, sucking lightly at his fingers as he withdrew them from between my lips.
For a moment, Ben just stared at me. Then, he cleared his throat a little and adjusted how he was sitting. “Well,” he said.
I blinked at him. “That turned you on?” I guessed. Ben snorted but didn't respond to that. I didn't know what I wanted him to say, anyway.
“So what did you want to do today?” he asked after a moment.
“I don't even know what my options are,” I said. “I mean, we could laze about the cabin, or...”
“We could laze about the cabin,” Ben agreed. “We've got a bunch of movies, or we could also do a puzzle. Maybe play some cards. But the weather's pretty nice today, so I was thinking that maybe we could go for a little hike, if you were feeling up to it. This area's really pretty—maybe not quite so much at this time of year, but I still think it's pretty impressive. Lots of great peaks in the area, but a little bit smaller. It actually kind of reminds me of England in some ways, although the color palette is a little more somber here.”
“That sounds nice,” I said. “As long as you don't make me sprint up one of said peaks!”
Ben laughed. “Nah,” he said. “I mostly just want to have a lazy weekend with you, or as lazy as I ever get. Just a little stroll through the woods, nothing major. Then we can come back and start up the fire and cozy up this evening—how does that sound?”
“That sounds really nice,” I said. Truthfully, I was already dreading having to get out of bed, because I was comfortable and warm here with him right now, our skin pressed against one another's. But I knew that we couldn't just stay lounging around like this all weekend; we'd go stir crazy by the end of it since we were both active people. A hike would be the perfect way to get a little energy out while still giving us enough time to be lazy in the evenings.
We finished eating in contented silence, and afterwards, I sighed a little. “This was really nice,” I said. “I mean, this is really nice.”
Ben smiled over at me. “I'm glad you think so,” he said. “I was a bit worried that you might start...I don't know, having second thoughts about all of this.”
I blinked over at him. “Second thoughts about…”
Ben shrugged. “Well, honestly, I was afraid that with the way I kept disappearing on you, you were going to start having second thoughts about being with me at all.”
I had a sudden flashback to kissing Dan at the frat party. I wondered if it was a flashback at all or if it was just an imagined memory, planted there because I knew, from Alex, that I had apparently kissed him, even if I didn't remember the details of the kiss. As much as I knew Ben wouldn't want to hear it…
“I kissed someone else,” I said in a rush, not looking at him. “It was dumb—it was so dumb—and it didn't mean anything. I didn't even really know the guy, I just met him at this party, and I was feeling really uncertain because you hadn't called me back, and I… I don't want to be one of those kinds of girls. Whatever kind of girl that might be. But I just...”
There was silence for a long moment, with Ben just staring at me. Then his face twisted bitterly and he climbed out of bed. “You said you were looking for the deal-breaker?” he said. “You just found it.”