Chapter Thirty-Nine
Parker
I noticed a distinct difference when I woke up Saturday morning. I moved my hand over the sheets, which were as cool as the rest of the room.
I rolled over and squinted at the bathroom. The door was open, but the light was off.
“Sienna?” I called.
I waited before calling for her again.
Still no answer.
Where the hell was she? The diner was closed today since we were going shopping with Tony. I figured she was going to sleep in.
I rolled out of bed and went out to the kitchen. It was the only other place I'd expect to find her. Yet when I went out there, I didn't see my sexy girlfriend anywhere.
“Sienna?”
I grabbed my phone, which I left charging in the entryway. I didn't need to be attached to it anymore, so I tended to forget it in different places. It was somewhat of a relief to be unplugged for a change.
I checked to see if she had left a message, but then the front door opened.
Sienna's eyes widened when she saw me standing there. “Oh, hey.”
She held a package in her hands and a roll of wrapping paper under her arm.
“Where were you?” I asked.
“I had to pick something up for you.”
“I wasn't expecting anything.”
“It's a gift, Parker.”
“For me?”
She laughed. “Duh. Do you need a few more hours of sleep?”
“I woke up without you. I was a little worried.”
She stood on her toes and kissed me. “That's sweet. I left early thinking you would still be asleep.”
“So, what's in the package?”
She slapped my hand away from it. “Breakfast first.”
“Well, that's not fair.”
“Well, you were supposed to be asleep. Besides, I'm starving.”
“Isn't it my turn to cook today?”
“Yup. And it's an easy one.”
Sienna took each meal as an opportunity to teach me how to cook. She usually saddled me with the easier tasks, but I had a feeling I'd have to do a little more legwork today to earn that package.
She went into the other room, and when she came back, she was empty-handed. I felt like a little kid on Christmas morning, unable to stop thinking about the gift. I hoped she wouldn’t drag her heels all morning.
Without mentioning the gift—I assumed that was her teasing the hell out of me—she put out all the ingredients for chocolate chip pancakes with strawberries and whipped cream. When she put out the whipped cream, I had dirty thoughts about Sienna wearing only the topping.
“I know what you're thinking,” she said. “And maybe if you don't complain too much about shopping today, then there's a possibility of it coming true.”
“Is that a promise?”
She shrugged noncommittally. “All right, stop stalling and let's get measuring.”
With the first batch, I ended up with more flour on my face than in the bowl. But after Sienna gave me pointers on how to measure properly, the batter started to look like what she normally made. And when it came time for the chocolate chips, I added way too many. It supposed it was better than too many eggs.
After getting the hang of how much batter to add to the hot pan, we waited for one side of the flapjack to cook.
“You didn't have to get me anything,” I said.
“I know. I wanted to, though.”
“Can you tell me what it is?” I asked.
“Nope,” she said, grinning. “If you can surprise me with an entire building, I can surprise you with something small.”
I stuck my lower lip out in a mock-pout.
“You’re adorable when you do that,” she said. “But I’m not going to tell you. I still need to wrap it, anyway.”
“How about I finish making the pancakes and you get my gift wrapped? Or we can skip that altogether, since I’m going to rip it open in two seconds.”
She eyed the griddle as if my mere presence would set it on fire. “Okay, but let me know if you need me.”
I kissed her. “I won’t. I’m getting better; even you said so yourself.”
“Eh,” she said indecisively but left the room anyway.
I stood by the door and listened to the rustling of paper. I wasn’t sure what I expected to hear, but I loved to guess what a present was before I opened it. It was a sick thing to do and something my parents never appreciated, but it was a habit that I wasn’t sure I could ever break.
“I smell something burning,” Sienna said from the other room.
I jolted and went back to the pancake. I shoved the spatula under it and flipped it. The cooked side was very cooked and nearly black. I decided that it wasn’t edible and I buried it in the trash can then quickly poured another one.
“Can you give me a hint?” I called into the other room.
“Parker, you seriously can’t wait?”
“I can’t.”
“Okay,” she said, laughing. “Your hint is us.”
“Us?” What the hell did that mean?
“Give me another hint.”
“No!” Then she cursed.
“You okay in there?”
“Yeah,” she's said. “Just cut myself with the scissors.”
“Don’t bleed on my gift.”
“I’ll bleed wherever I damned well please.”
I smiled and shook my head. If anyone who didn’t know us could overhear us, they would think we were always arguing. It was the opposite, in fact. I could be brutally honest with her and she could take it in stride. Not many women would do that, especially at our ages. I hoped we kept the same teenager maturity level throughout our lives together. It kept us young and always on our toes.
I managed to get three pancakes done by the time she came back into the kitchen.
She lifted each one from the plate and inspected them. “These look great.”
“You’re not being nice?”
“When am I ever nice to you?” she reached up and kissed me.
She chopped the strawberries while I tried to crack her about the gift, but she was like a steel vault.
She set up two place settings and had the coffee done in the time it took me to finish the pancakes. I needed to figure out how to multi-task eventually.
“Do you want the gift before or after we eat?”
“Before!” I said.
She shook her head. “You’re too much, Parker. Are you sure you’re almost thirty? I’d say you were closer to thirteen.”
“Get my gift, woman!” I said and pointed to the other room.
She made a show of bowing before me. “As you wish.”
She left the kitchen and came back a few seconds later. She handed me the gift wrapped in the same shiny silver paper that she’d come in with this morning. I thought it was a lot of fanfare, but I didn’t question her too much. She seemed excited to get me something. So I wanted to keep that smile on her face.
I took the gift from her hands and placed it on the now-clean breakfast bar. It was thin but quite heavy.
“It’s fragile,” she noted.
I carefully pulled the seam apart and lifted the paper from the object. My heart was thrumming in my chest. Sienna wasn’t the type to give people gifts unless they were incredibly thoughtful and well-deserved. I didn’t remember the last time she gave me a physical present, maybe a birthday a couple of years ago. We normally celebrated by going out to a restaurant or bar. She’d said her presence was present enough. And I agreed. If I ever needed something, I was always able to get it myself.
Removing the paper carefully, I revealed the back of a picture frame. Turning it over, I homed in on a photo that was taken of us at our senior prom. Then there was one of us on vacation with our families. Sienna and I were on a beach mid-jump as the waves crashed into the shore behind us. My gaze moved to one that was taken last year before I started dating Rachel. It was a candid photo of us at some bar. I vaguely remembered Tony taking the photo. Sienna and I were making gross faces at each other. I laughed at the memory. The other photos were from various points in our lives.
“I wanted to show where we came from, so we can always look back on it in the future,” she said.
“Sienna,” I said, my eyes darting around to each of the photos. My brain fell back into each memory of us. Some of them I’d forgotten until that point. “This is the best gift anyone has ever given me.”
She shrugged. “I thought it was better than buying you something. A bottle of cologne wouldn’t have been on par with what you did for me.”
“You’re right.”
This must have taken Sienna some time to do. There had to be at least two dozen perfectly placed photos of us. She wasn’t the creative type, so I appreciated the effort she put into this even more.
“You would have never done this if we weren’t dating,” I said. “I’m starting to think you really like me.”
“No, actually,” she said with a grin. “I really love you.”
“I love it,” I said and pulled her to me. I looked down into her hazel eyes and kissed her. I tried to put all of my love into the kiss, showing her how much I appreciated the gift and her presence in my life.
“Okay,” she said. “Now I’m really hungry.”
I propped up the frame so we could look at it while eating our breakfast. Sienna plated the pancakes and made a smiley face with strawberries as the mouth and whipped cream dots for the eyes on each of them. It was something she normally did for the children at the diner when they ordered pancakes. I looked at the photos again, reliving the moments from our own childhoods. This was the perfect gift to look back on for the years to come.
But I had one more present for her up my sleeve.