Page 97 of It's Always Sonny
I look at him innocently while my fingers absolutely send the pic to the Janes. Duke will see it shortly after, but he knows better than to send it to the team.
Probably.
A whoosh issues from my phone, and his bright eyes widen. “You didn’t!”
“Hey, at least it’s not your abs, right?”
He hangs his head, laughing. “You are terrifying, did you know that?”
“Lil ol’ me?”
He kicks off his shoes and strips back down to his boxer briefs.
“Dude!” I say. “Ash was right about your tummy waffles!”
“Oh, I know. They’re the stuff of women’s dreams,” he teases, pushing me to the side and slipping into the sleeping bag. He’s cold again, but it’s nothing compared to last night. “Warm me up.”
My pleasure.
We settle back into the same position, him lying on his back and me snuggled firmly against him. His breathing slows almost as soon as we’re together, and so does mine.
I lie there and listen to him breathe, feeling the rise and fall of his chest against mine. His breath stirs my hair and puffs against my neck and cheek, and I close my eyes and breathe slowly in. So slowly, so deeply.
It’s silent outside the tent. It’s the type of quiet that absorbs sound, the type where snow blankets the ground and dampens everything, giving the world a stillness that no other phenomenon can provide.
I inhale without thinking about it, letting the rise and fall of my chest match Sonny’s.
And then something happens. Something I can’t remember happening in … ever. Something I forgot my body was even capable of doing.
As I inhale, the knot in my chest—that permanent tight spot that pinches my lungs—releases. Air rushes into parts of my lungs I thought were permanently closed off. I feel like I’ve been standing ten feet from the top of a mountain, unable to see the vista, and now I’ve finally reached the pinnacle and can see everything. Absolutely everything.
And it is glorious.
Is this how breathing is supposed to feel? So heady and sustaining? I could cry at how good it feels. It’s intoxicating. I breathe again, and again, I reach that same sensation of my lungs being totally, blissfully, perfectly full.
A tear falls down my cheek.
I inhale again as more tears fall.
“Did you like what I said to Buster and Jimmy?”
Of course he feels the tears pooling against his shoulder, under my cheek. I would normally dash them away, but instead, I raise my head and put my arms on his chest so I can take him all in.
“How did you know I was listening?”
“Apart from hearing the echo of my own voice through the tent?” he asks. I pinch his waist, and he squeals. “Millie told me you never miss a week.”
“So much for Jane code.”
“She’s one of my best friends, too, you know.”
“I know.”
“I know words of affirmation aren’t your love language, but I don’t know how to serve people like you do, so I’m just gonna be me for a minute and not apologize for it. Okay?”
“Um—”
“PJ, you are remarkable. You’re so smart, it’s almost intimidating, but you don’t make people feel dumb for not knowing something. And when you don’t know something, you ask. I don’t know how hard that is for you to do, considering how afraid you’ve always been of not measuring up, but you do it anyway. That takes maturity. Do you know how rare that is? You have the prettiest smile, but your scowl steals my breath.”