Page 9 of The Warmth of Our Closest Star

“Enzo?” I started at the sound of Peter’s voice coming from the living room. “I’m going to take your bags upstairs if that’s okay?”

I swallowed and responded in kind.

“That is okay!”

Peter didn’t respond but I could hear him carrying my things up the stairs. When I turned back to the fireplace, I felt a tear in the corner of my eye. It had been a long time since I had been in a home and screamed a response to a question. Years had gone by since I had been in a home with proof of life I hadn’t created myself. I shook my head, refusing to entertain those thoughts, and walked across the room to look out at the backyard from one of the windows that were on either side of the enormous television.

Minnesota was temperate in mid-summer. Though warm, it was pleasant, so it was no wonder that I found the backyard lush and mostly green. The memory of my one perfect night with Peter in Montreal flashed through my mind as I spotted the patio, pergola, and grill that he had described to me then. I wondered if Peter would grill hamburgers and hot dogs or even steaks for us during my visit. Would we sit under the pergola in the evening hours under the stars, eating our dinner and discussing…everything?

I found that I was already imagining what life with Peter as a partner would be like, so I chased those thoughts away, too. Vegetation towards the back of the property caught my eye and I gasped with delight. I turned around, as though expecting Peter to be right there so I could tell him what I had spotted. Laughing to myself, I jogged from the den down the hallway and through the living room to the entryway.

Up the stairs, I found a door to my immediate left. A guestroom? A bit further down the hall, I found a large bathroom for guests, then another bedroom after that. When I made my way to the end of the hall, where the stairs down to the kitchen began, I found a door to my right. Light streamed out into the hallway from the large windows in the massive room. Peter was standing at the end of the bed, and my eyes lit up.

“Peter,” I said excitedly as I stepped into the room.

He turned to look at me and a grin bloomed on his face. “Yeah?”

“You have sorrel growing in your backyard,” I said. “At the edge of the yard.”

“Do I?” he asked. “Oh. Yeah. In spring wild garlic grows out there, too. I usually let the lawn guys harvest it for themselves, but I take some to use from time to time.”

I grinned. “I bet it is delicious.”

“It is,” he said. “Is…do you eat sorrel?”

“You can,” I said with a shrug. “Some people like it. Some don’t. I like it. Maman would make it into a soup, and—”

I trailed off, my eyes lowering. Silence filled Peter’s bedroom.

“You like everything even remotely edible,” he said, teasing me to lighten the mood, but he wasn’t wrong. “It’s one of the things that makes you so wonderful.”

My cheeks felt red, so I turned to look at his bedroom. After my tour downstairs, I didn’t feel as self-conscious snooping around Peter’s bedroom, even with him watching. The cavernous room held a bed so large that surely four men could sleep in it. That thought made my cheeks redder, so I pushed it away. Two dark wood tables with drawers sat on either side of the bed, and both had lamps on top of them. A large dresser of the same wood lined the wall next to the door and probably contained more clothes than I had ever owned in my life.

A bay of windows with dark wood plantation shutters was across the room from the bed. Two armchairs sat before the windows, facing the bed. A small round table positioned between the chairs completed the sitting area. A large door on the wall opposite the entrance led into a bathroom, but the angle was such that I couldn’t see inside.

Where Peter was standing at the end of his bed was a small knee-high bench, upon which he had set my suitcase and bag. When I saw my bags on the bench, inside his bedroom, something in my stomach fluttered. I felt faint for a moment. Peter noticed my gaze and winced.

“It was probably presumptuous of me,” he said slowly. “You don’t have to sleep in here with me. You probably saw the other rooms, so—”

“No,” I stopped him, taking in and releasing a soothing breath. “No. I suppose I just—”

“Enzo, you don’t—”

“I never thought that I would actually be able to visit you in America,” I said. “I wanted to. Desperately. But I never believed it. I…I have struggled to believe anything for a while. But…now I’m here. It is real.”

I knew I wasn’t explaining myself well at all.

Peter was nodding along slowly.

“I guess I assumed we could share my bed,” he said, his voice measured. “On Sunday, we can have breakfast over there.”

He flicked his head at the two chairs and the small table by the windows.

“Have a perfect Sunday,” he said.

My stomach fluttered again. He remembered.

Finally, he cocked his head towards the bed.