Chapter 145
Emily's POV
Alex leaned down and kissed me—slow and sweet and unhurried, the kind of kiss that felt like punctuation, like a promise. When he pulled back, his expression had shifted into something more serious, and he reached out to brush a strand of hair away from my face.
"You okay?" he asked.
"Yeah," I said, and I meant it. "I am."
"Good." He straightened up and grabbed a pair of jeans from the closet for himself. "Come on. Mason's probably got dinner ready by now, and if we make him wait too long he's going to start spiraling again."
He was right. I could practically feel Mason's anxiety radiating through the walls, like he was standing in the kitchen convincing himself that we'd changed our minds about him, that any second now we were going to come out and tell him to leave.
I pushed myself up off the bed—less gracefully than I would've liked—and followed Alex back out into the main living space.
Mason had set the table with actual plates and silverware, which was more effort than any of us usually bothered with during the week, and there was a large skillet in the center piled with what looked like chicken and vegetables in some kind of cream sauce over pasta. It smelled incredible, rich and savory and exactly what my wrung-out body needed, and I felt my stomach respond with an audible growl.
Mason looked up when we came in, and I watched the tension in his shoulders ease just slightly when he saw us—together, dressed, not fighting.
"It's ready," he said, and his voice was still tentative, still careful, like he was waiting for someone to tell him he'd done something wrong.
"It looks amazing," I said, and I meant it. I pulled out a chair and sat down, then looked up at him with what I hoped was an encouraging smile. "Seriously. You didn't have to go to all this trouble."
"It's not trouble," he said quickly, almost defensively. "I just—" He stopped, his hands twisting in the dish towel he was holding. "I wanted to."
Alex sat down across from me and started serving himself without comment, and after a moment Mason joined us at the table. We ate in relative silence for a few minutes—the kind of silence that felt less awkward than it should have, more like we were all too tired and too full of complicated feelings to navigate small talk.
The food was good. Better than good, actually. Mason had somehow managed to make grocery store chicken and basic pantry staples taste like something you'd order at a restaurant, and I made a mental note to compliment him properly once I had the energy for full sentences.
"So," Alex said eventually, setting down his fork and looking at Mason with that assessing expression he got when he was trying to figure someone out. "What's your plan?"
Mason's hand stilled halfway to his mouth. "My plan?"
"For work. For staying here. For—" Alex gestured vaguely around the apartment. "All of this."
I shot Alex a look that I hoped conveyed can you not do this right now, but he ignored me.
"I don't know," Mason said, his voice going tight and defensive again. "I thought—I mean, Emily said I could—"
"Relax," Alex said, and there was no heat in his voice, just that same cool curiosity. "I'm not trying to kick you out. I'm asking what you want to do. Because sitting around here all day waiting for Emily to come home isn't a plan. It's just... waiting."
Mason looked at me, and I could see the panic starting to build in his eyes—the fear that this was it, this was the moment where I changed my mind and told him he had to leave after all.
"Ignore him," I said, keeping my voice steady. "You can stay as long as you want. We already talked about this."
"I know," Mason said, but he didn't sound convinced. "But he's right. I should—I should probably get a job. Help out more. I don't want to just—"
"You cook," I said, cutting him off before he could spiral. "That's helping."
"That's not—"
"It is." I set down my own fork and looked at him directly, making sure he could see I meant it. "I'm serious, Mason. I don't need you to go get some random job to prove you're pulling your weight. You said you don't like cooking, right? Except when you're cooking for me."
He nodded slowly, his eyes still wary.
"Then that's what you do," I said. "You stay here. You make food. And when I come home at the end of the day, there's dinner waiting. That makes me happy. That's what I want. Okay?"
"But that's—" He stopped, his brow furrowing. "That's not enough. That's barely anything."
"It's not barely anything," I said, and I heard my voice sharpen just slightly. "Do you know what you're describing? You're talking about taking care of a household. About making sure the people in it are fed and taken care of. That's not 'barely anything.' That's the work of a homemaker, and that work has value. A lot of value. The fact that our culture doesn't recognize it doesn't make it less real."
Mason stared at me like I'd just said something in a language he didn't understand.
"You're taking on the role of a housewife," I continued, softer now. "Or house-husband, or whatever you want to call it. And anyone who's ever been a housewife—anyone who's ever done that work—deserves to have it seen and valued. So don't sit here and tell me it's not enough."
His throat worked, and I saw his eyes go bright and wet before he looked down at his plate.
"Okay," he said, his voice barely above a whisper. "Okay. If that's—if that's really what you want."
"It is."
Alex made a soft sound that might've been approval or amusement, and when I glanced over at him he was watching me with an expression I couldn't quite read—something warm and assessing and maybe a little bit proud.
We finished dinner after that, and the conversation shifted to safer topics—work, logistics, the fact that Ethan was flying back tomorrow and would be home late. Mason started to relax again, his shoulders loosening and his voice losing that brittle edge, and by the time we were clearing the table he was almost smiling.
I helped him with the dishes despite his protests, and Alex disappeared into the bedroom to make some work calls. When everything was clean and put away, Mason hovered near the counter like he wasn't sure what to do next, and I reached out and squeezed his arm.
"Thank you," I said. "For dinner. For all of it."
"You don't have to keep thanking me," he said, but he was smiling for real now, small and tentative but genuine.
"I'm going to anyway."
He laughed—a quiet, surprised sound—and for the first time since I'd found him in the rain, he looked like maybe he believed this could work.