Page 52 of I Will Always Love You (Maybe)

It’s only been two weeks, almost a quarter of the total time that I’ve known her, but I swear I didn’t remember how beautiful she was. I don’t have any pictures of her, and I thought I distorted the beauty in my mind. That somehow the little gap in her front teeth was not as endearing, her pale cheekbones blushed with pink wasn’t quite as sweet, that her Bambi-brown eyes didn’t catch the light the way that they did.

But I was wrong. She’s even more beautiful.

“Do you want to sit down?” I ask, pointing to the patio set. When she nods, I follow her to the covered area, sink into the cushioned chairs, and stuff my shaky hands underneath my legs while I wait for her to speak.

Her gaze sweeps mine and she nibbles at the corner of her lip. “I listened to the journal, and the podcast.”

My heart is still kicking against my chest from the run up the hill, but now it’s leaped and stuck in my throat. The moment of truth has arrived. My stomach is turning so much that I feel nearly sick. Sending my journal was the most vulnerable thing I’ve ever done. It’s my diary, my innermost thoughts, it’s me. All of me.

“I want you to know that I didn’t do that for some manipulation tactic. I just… I knew that you deserved all of the truth, and this was the way to give it to you.” My face is beating so red that it feels like a blood vessel will explode. “Please know that I will completely respect your decision. If you want to never talk to me again, just say so. Of course I will be heartbroken, more than you probably know, but it’s okay. Or if you want to be friends, even better. I would love to be your friend. You can come here whenever you want, you can visit Kona, you can take your walks and chop wood and we can snuggle—or not—while watching shows. Really, you tell me how I can fit into your world, and I’ll do it.”

Josie hesitates for so long after I say this that I score all of my words to make sure I made sense. She brushes off debris from the table and watches it flutter to the ground, then takes a deep inhale. “What if I don’t want to be friends?”

It’s fair. It’s so unbelievably fair from what I did to her. My heart drops into my stomach, and dammit, my eyes are turning shiny from tears. I promised myself if she came here or wanted to talk, I wouldn’t cry in front of her. I bat them back and give her a sad nod. “It’s okay. I understand,” I say, swallowing back the choked sob. “Then I’ll say, thank you for the time you’ve shared with me, and I’ll remember you forever. You’ve opened something up in me that I thought was dead, and from here on, for the rest of my life, I will be forever grateful.”

Her chin trembles, and that flush in her cheeks spreads. “What if I want to be more than friends?”

My heart leaps. Does she mean that? I don’t want to get my hopes up, don’t want to leap out of the chair and scare the hell out of her, but my legs are buzzing with energy, my arms heavy with the need to pull her into them. I catch her gaze, reading her, the hope and fear, the hesitation.

Josie stares at her hands for a long while before speaking. “You have no idea how much it meant that you spoke to Amelia’s spirit about me. For so long, I’ve felt sort of invisible, and never thought I’d impact anyone enough to do something like that.” She reaches down to rub Kona’s ears, clearly adopting the same nervous coping mechanism I’ve had all these years. “It still really hurts that you withheld your identity, and the show, and honestly, we are going to have to spend a lot of time rebuilding that trust. But I’m game to do it… if you want to.”

If I want to? Right now, I would do just about anything to keep Josie in my life. Rebuilding trust, starting at the very beginning, starting over, whatever it takes, I am all in. “Of course I want to.” My heart feels so open and raw, but now is the time to lay it all out. “I want you in my life. Everything feels lighter, more acute, sharper. You bring that joy, that sparkle, that I’ve been missing. I will spend whatever time it takes regaining that trust.”

Josie drops her hand from Kona, and brings it back to her lap, with a soft smile tugging at the corner of her mouth. “I don’t want you to think this is going to be an unfair playing field or anything. I still have things to work out on my own, and I absolutely let my inherent trust issues affect me. We’re both still trying to find our way and navigating what this sort of post-self-discovery world looks like for us. But there is no one else I’d rather be on this ride with than you.”

And yep, my heart has officially leaped from my stomach and back into my chest. Her smile, the sincerity in her eyes, the way she’s looking at me, I want to take it all in. “Really?”

Tears form behind her lashes, and she nods. “I love this.” She waves her hand to the forest, to Kona, to me. “I love what this is and what it all represents. And I love the new me. Well, maybe it’s not the new me, but it’s just me. I love who I’ve transitioned into, who I’m still learning to become, that I’m stronger than I ever thought.” She swallows and the tears slide down her cheek. “And… I love you.”

The words are so soft, lobbed so tenderly but carrying so much healing weight that it feels like she’s hugging me. I push away from the chair and kneel in front of her, holding her in my arms as she embraces me back. I’m lifting and breaking and healing, with her touch, with her words, and my body trembles. “You do?” I whisper, needing to hear it again, needing the confirmation that I’m not alone on this, needing to know that even though this is scary, for me, for her, that I trust we will ride along together.

She pulls back and cups my cheeks in her hands. “I do. I really love you.” Her dark eyes travel mine. “I know we’re going to have ups and downs, and not everything will be smooth, but you are the only person I want to do this with. We are worth figuring this all out, together.”

Josie leans in, presses her soft mouth against mine, and I melt into her. The way her body feels against me, the way our hearts are pounding against each other, the way that she is stitching me back together one minute at a time, fills my soul. “I love you, too,” I say and then kiss her again.

After Amelia died, I was lost. In who I was, in what I wanted to be. And I never thought I would find love again. My body fills with the type of gratitude that I’ve only read about in books, the type of warmth I’ve only seen in movies. I squeeze her into me, bury my head into her shoulders, and sigh. “How about you get trapped here for the next, I don’t know… lifetime.”

A soft giggle, the most beautiful sound in the world, escapes her lips. When Kona makes a huff, clearly annoyed that she is not getting any attention, we both grin and break our embrace. She lays one hand on Kona’s fur, one hand on mine, and smiles.

“That sounds… heavenly.”

EPILOGUE

COLBY

One year later

“Hey, everyone. Welcome to the Half-Assed Life Hacks podcast. I’m your host, Colby Jackson. Today we have a very special guest, my beautiful, smart, and amazing girlfriend, Josie.”

“Please keep going. I’ll wait,” Josie says with a chuckle as she adjusts her headphones. “Hi, everyone! Glad to be here.”

I’m glad she’s here, too. It took Josie a bit of convincing—six months to be exact—to be on her first show. This is only the fifth one she’s done, and even though she’s told me over and over she can’t stand to hear herself on the podcast and is worried that she sounds ridiculous, the fan letters that come in for her, begging for her to join the show, tells something totally different. Josie has that natural charm that I fell in love with last year, and it resonates over audio to the listeners as strongly as it resonates in our home.

Our home. Sometimes, I can’t even. Although Josie and I had what we call a quick-start relationship, we’ve taken this last year at a beautiful snail’s pace. After spending only a few nights a week at my place for a solid several months, she increased her visits to the point where finally, only a few months ago, she moved in permanently.

I suck up every second with her I can. I love cooking for her, and I pretend I love the dinners she makes me. We go in the hot tub every chance we get, she takes long solo walks, and I pout over the debilitating jealousy that Kona has a new favorite, no matter how many treats I give her.

“As many of you know, Josie is a vet tech, helping heal one animal at a time. Today, we are going to be talking about the best way to bathe a dog, what to do if you’re alone with a bear in the woods, and the best hidden vacation spots in northwest Minnesota. And next week, we’ll be following up on the series we started last month for tasty, easy recipes to get you over the long winter. And of course, we’ll have a throwback to the love advice podcast, where Josie and I will each give our perspectives.”

“Tip number one. Just nod, smile, and refrain from telling the other person that you’re right, even when you know dang well that you are, in fact, right,” Josie says with a laugh. “Now, on to bathing our fur babies. Let’s face it, friends. Dogs can be stinky. Trust me, our girl Kona here can probably win some awards on that. But did you know for some dogs, bathing too much can actually be hurting your animal? We need to look at breed, coat…”

As Josie talks into the mic, glancing at her notes that I know she doesn’t need because she’s phenomenal at her job, I sit back and marvel at what we’ve become.

When I released the episode last year, outing myself and my identity, I thought I was prepared for what would happen, but I wasn’t. There was way more backlash than I anticipated. I was the trending topic on several social media sites. I got hate messages and emails, DMs that I could barely comprehend, people leaving angry voice messages about me being a fraud, sponsors pulling from the show, and others telling me that they hated me. Even with the harshest messages, the relief I felt about being out, about Josie coming back, helped me ride that turbulent storm.

But the other thing I wasn’t expecting? The love. The massive outpouring of love from all over the country. People writing in about their own experiences with loss and grief, people sending me messages of encouragement. A small army of troll defenders on social media telling people to look past the identity piece and how much value the show has brought to their life. Dozens and dozens of the people that I gave advice to on the show wrote in to tell me how I positively affected their world.

And Josie stood by me this entire time, holding me when I cried with guilt, celebrating with me as each message of encouragement came in.

And now, as she wraps up her segment, I mouth, I love you, and she winks and continues talking about oatmeal-based shampoos and drying times in the winter.

I don’t know what the rest of my life will look like. Will I do this podcast forever? Will Josie and I get married and grow old together? What does the universe have in store? No one knows. But what I do know is that I am ready for what the world gives me, and I’m going to tackle my life, head-on, one step at a time.

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