“Have a normal day.”
I grinned.
“That’s right.”
He grinned tentatively back, then added on a modifier.
“A normal Abby day.”
I nodded, and watched the decision-making process take hold.
At first, he didn’t know quite what to make of it. But after a moment’s consideration, the thought appealed to him greatly. His eyes lit up, and he took a giant step forward.
“Where do we begin?”
I couldn’t help but laugh at his enthusiasm. It was catching. And adorable as hell. He was like a little kid with a new toy, aching to try it out. Dimples and all.
“Well,” I began slowly, “a good friend of mine recently exiled all my things to an unknown storage locker, so I might start with a little online shopping to repleni
sh.” I took one look at his incredulous expression, and rolled my eyes. “It’s not an urban legend, Nick. People actually do buy things off the internet. Not everything has to be purchased in a private viewing.”
He shook his head at the floor, eyes wide with wonder.
“I have to text all my friends...”
“Very funny,” I snorted. Then I gestured to the couch. “So is that okay? Is it alright if I set up down here, or—”
This time, it was his turn to laugh.
“Abby, you don’t need to ask permission. This is your house now too.” He spread his arms wide, gesturing all around. “What’s mine is yours. No exceptions.”
Again—profoundly touched.
I hid it well, watching with a touch of amusement as he started rambling on about all the ‘normal’ things the two of us could do. Most of them were clearly stolen from a domestic TV show, and throughout the entire process, he seemed to have completely forgotten he was naked.
It wasn’t until he started seriously considering the prospect of getting a dog, that I cleared my throat softly to get his attention.
“Nick...normal people don’t go skinny-dipping in the middle of the living room floor.”
He paused mid-rant, then glanced down without a hint of shame.
“Right that...that makes some degree of sense.” With a grin that could scarcely contain his excitement, he scooped up a towel, fastened it around his waist, and sprinted up the stairs, taking them four at a time. “Let me just get dressed, I’ll be down in a minute!”
“You do that,” I answered, doing my very best to keep from laughing.
A second later a door slammed shut, but his voice still echoed down the winding stairs.
“Don’t start without me!”
AFTER OVER TWO YEARS of gallivanting all over the globe with Nick, cleaning up his various messes, I had thought there was very little left that could surprise me. Very little ground we had left to cover, or things we had yet to try. I was wrong.
Nick and I had yet to have a normal day.
“This is blowing my fucking mind right now.” He leaned past me to get a better look at the screen, inadvertently covering my face with a fan of his hair. “You just type in anything you want, and they’ll find you a seller? Anything you can think of?”
Although it clearly went against his every restless instinct, he had taken to our newfound stagnancy like a fish to water—deliberately hollowing out a little crater for himself in the couch cushions, just so it looked like he had been there longer than he had. Online shopping, in particular, was a source of great entertainment and fun. Perhaps, because it was the only bit of common ground he was likely to find—Nick loved to spend money.
“For fuck’s sake,” I spat out a mouthful of his hair, “this cannot possibly be the first time you’ve done this. How have you never heard of Amazon?”