Once he’s finished putting me in a blissful pleasure coma, Carter curls his arms around me and pulls my back snugly against his chest, keeping me close.
“Tell me something I don’t know about you,” I request.
“Something you don’t know? Hm. I like rough sex.”
I chuckle, lightly smacking the hand he has settled on my hip. “Very funny.”
“I like blondes,” he offers, playing with a flaxen lock of my hair.
“Carter Mahoney. Something real.”
“I don’t know what you want me to tell you,” he says, being difficult, just because he’s him.
“I’d like to know everything, so feel free to start anywhere—except ‘my favorite color is blue,’ because that doesn’t really tell me anything.”
“Tells you what color lingerie you should invest in,” he offers.
Cocking an eyebrow, I look over my shoulder at him and say sweetly, “Oh, but you’ve already bought me Longhorn blue panties. Remember, baby?”
Sliding me an unamused look, he says, “I’ve never had a pet. How’s that?”
I’ll take that, I suppose. “Really? Why not? Allergies? Just didn’t want one?”
“Until I was 13, we lived in Manhattan. It’s harder to have a dog in the city and my dad doesn’t like cats. Mom said I could get a fish, but that’s a pretty lame pet, don’t you think?”
“I had a fish, actually. A goldfish named Juniper. Unfortunately, it didn’t live for much longer than a year. I wouldn’t mind having fish again as an adult, if I had an actual aquarium with a filtration system and all that. Colorful gravel in the bottom, some of those cute coral things for them to play hide and seek in when I’m trying to find them in the tank.”
Curling his hand around my hip, he says, “See, you even make fish sound like fun. I always imagined it floating in the tank all bug-eyed and getting bored with it in ten minutes.”
I crack a smile. “You probably would. My fish would be my reading buddy. I’d set up a comfy chair in the corner by its aquarium and read it some of my favorite passages. When I’m so tired of studying for classes that I wanna die, I would turn to my fish for moral support. My fish would feel very important, and it would like me a lot more than yours would like you.”
“Without a doubt. You’d probably chop up fucking broccoli to feed it snacks. I might remember to put some fish flakes in its bowl.”
I shake my head. “You’re never allowed to have fish unless we live together or you have hired help, tasked with caring for the fish. Promise me.”
“Aw, come on. Chloe would probably like a fish if it had all that colorful shit in the tank. She’d name it something stupid like Princess Penelope. It’d be great.”
“Chloe would probably take better care of it than you, and she’s five.” Since we’re back on the subject of Chloe, though, I take advantage and guide us back to more important things. “Speaking of Chloe…”
“There it is,” he murmurs, knowing what’s coming.
“What’s the plan?” I ask him. “You’re actually going to set up a bedroom for her at your place.” I pause, rolling onto my back so I can look at him less awkwardly. “So, are you planning for her to move in with you at some point? Is this custody situation with your parents temporary, or permanent? Are they just caring for her while you’re in school, or…?”
Carter sighs heavily, like this weighs on his mind, too. I imagine him losing sleep thinking about it nights when I’m not here. “I don’t know. It’s kind of a mess. The original plan was for them to take her on permanently, full-time. I didn’t want any part of it. But then she was born, y’know? She was a cute little shit, right out of the gate. My mom, she’s the one who insisted on raising her, but she goes through these bouts of depression. When they hit her, sometimes she can’t even get out of bed, and one hit her when Chloe was six weeks old. My sister tried to come over and help as much as she could, but she had her own stuff going on, so I ended up spending a lot of time with Chloe without meaning to. I’d just prop her up on her pillow on my bed while I did homework. She’d chew on her fist and watch me like a cute little creep.”
I grin at the mental image of a baby keeping an eye on Carter.
“Anyway, she grew on me before long. I didn’t worry much about her living situation until moving back to New York for college became a reality. Now it’s something I’ve gotta think about, but it’s not exactly simple. If I move away, she’ll get used to never seeing me. Then my parents will be her only caregivers, and I’ll pretty much… I can never tell her the truth if we do that. She’ll feel like I abandoned her—especially since my parents aren’t exactly the best, temperament-wise. My mom means well, but she’s all fucked up. My dad’s mean. Chloe’s a tough cookie, I know she’d be all right if I left her here, but… I don’t know.”