When in Rome(81)

“If things were different…” he begins. “If you weren’t a celebrity, and I didn’t have…”

“It’s okay, Noah. I understand. I really do.” I finish counting his buttons because tears are an imminent threat. “You have eight, by the way. Eight buttons.”

His fingers continue to trail languidly over my face and hair and neck and arm and back up again. He touches me like I’m precious to him. It makes me ache all the more.

“Distract me.” I’m the one to ask this time.

His fingers pause momentarily before they continue their repeating pattern. “I cheated on a biology test in high school. James let me see his paper.” This one makes me laugh. He does, too, after blowing out a dramatic breath of air. “It’s good to get that off my chest.”

I curl up into a little ball at the front of his body. “I accidentally killed my goldfish,” I say, making Noah chuckle, full and rumbly. I softly pinch his arm. “Don’t laugh! I feel terrible about it. I left for my last tour and completely forgot to arrange for anyone to come feed it. When I came home, it was floating belly-up. Still haunts me.”

“Remind me to never let you own a dog.” Noah’s hand slides down to settle against my lower back. He holds me close and his face tips forward so he can whisper his next confession against my ear. “I love your voice.”

Love. Oof. That word takes on a life of its own and beats between us. I know we haven’t known each other long, and somehow it hurts that we’ll never get the chance, because I think I’ve fallen in love with Noah.

“But not enough to own any of my albums apparently,” I tease, desperately needing to lighten the air between us.

“It’s better that way. Imagine how creeped out you’d be if you’d turned on the CD in my truck and it had been one of yours.”

“I would have been flattered.”

“Liar.”

I nuzzle my face against his warm neck shamelessly. Because somehow I know that in this darkness, all bets are off. I can be as nuts as I want. I could snort his skin if I wanted and he would smile. “You’re the only man I wouldn’t mind being obsessed with me.”

“Sorry,” he says, and he lets that word dangle a moment. “I reserve my obsessions for flowers, Pop-Tart.”

I actually like Pop-Tarts, he had said that day in The Pie Shop.

And there it goes. My heart grabs hold of a swarm of balloons and leaves the earth. Off to find heaven it goes. Thunder booms again, but this time, Noah doesn’t seem to notice. He’s enamored with my hair and the curve of my ear.

“Amelia…” he says in this raw way that lets me know his head is in exactly the same place as mine. It keeps diving back into what if and hunting around for options that don’t exist. “I want to let it happen so badly—but I don’t think I’m the kind of guy who will ever be okay with you being gone for nine months at a time.”

I almost tell him it would be more like three months at a time, because I’ll have small breaks here and there. I could use those breaks to come here, and I’d fly him out to visit me on tour in between. But I don’t think it would matter. “Noah, you don’t have to keep explaining it to me. I really do understand and see where you’re coming from. It’s difficult to date a celebrity, and that’s honestly why relationships don’t last long in my circles. I get it. And I wouldn’t want to put you in that position.”

He laughs but it sounds more self-deprecating than humorous. “This would be a lot easier if you were just a little selfish and annoying. Could you be more terrible from now on?”

“I’ll try.” A tear that’s been clinging to my lashes slips down my cheek. This feels more painful than it should. It really sucks to be mature and decide all this on the precipice of something instead of the end. Why did I have to fall for someone whose world is on a completely different axis than mine?

“So what do we do now?” I ask, as his soft cotton shirt caresses my cheek and absorbs the tears I really wish I wasn’t crying.

“I don’t know,” he says honestly, his fingers still idly playing with my hair. Twisting it around his fingers. Letting it drop and then twisting it all over again like he’s finally getting to do the thing he’s wanted for days. “What happens at the end of Roman Holiday?”

Gregory Peck’s face surfaces once again in my mind. “Audrey—Princess Ann—leaves and goes back to her life. And Gregory Peck—Joe Bradley—stays in his.”

His fingers press into my back. It’s not a hopeful press. It’s a desperate one. “What about before that?”

I laugh sadly, thinking of Audrey and Gregory eating ice cream, riding a moped, touring Rome. “They have fun together.”

Noah presses his lips to my forehead, lingering there for a full in-and-out breath before pulling away. “What if we do, too? Is that too selfish? What if I suggested we just drop all our rules and…”

“Accept the time we have together? It could work if we manage expectations from the start.” I finish his thought—hoping a little too hard that that’s what he was going to suggest. Because if there’s an option where I hang on to Noah for dear life while I can—selfishly soak up every memory with him that is available to me—I will. I have a feeling that a temporary fling with Noah would be better than an entire year with another man.