Blue Plaid

Domesticity

In which Tyson finds everything to be weirdly normal.

Humming to myself as I slowly dragged the wooden spoon through the meat sauce, I glanced to the lounge room to make sure Cooper was still contently playing with his toy cars. He giggled as he pushed the model red Mustang across the wooden floor, vibrating his lips to making an engine noise as he crawled.

I smiled and turned my attention back to the dinner I was creating. Cooper had already been fed his dinner of bowtie pasta with vegetables in a cream sauce and was playing before he needed to be put to bed. Generally, Stella was the one home for dinner time, but now that I was unemployed, I took it upon myself to make the most of my culinary abilities and cook up a proper meal.

Stella had been gone all day, shooting a series of commercials for the clothing brand she was the face of, which meant she was going to be exhausted when she got back and I knew spaghetti with meat sauce was her comfort food.

The door opened just as I turned off the stove and I flashed a smile at Stella as she stepped through the door, looking stunning as always, her hair windblown and her cheeks and nose red from the cold.

“Hey,” I greeted as she shut the door and dropped her purse to the floor before stepping out of the tall, flat black boots she was wearing over her jeans. “Perfect timing. Dinner’s almost ready.”

“Great!” she breathed out, pausing to inhale the smell of the meat sauce deeply as she shrugged off her pea coat and tossed it over a kitchen chair before padding across the apartment to where Cooper was playing, squatting down to kiss him on the head before turning back towards me. “I’m starving. What are we having?”

“Take a look,” I nodded towards the pots on the stove as I lay the wooden spoon on the granite countertop as she made her way towards the stove.

She stood on her tiptoes unnecessarily as she peered into the pots, a smile slowly stretching her lips when her gaze lifted to meet mine. “My favorites.”

“I know,” I grinned.

Her smile widened and she stepped towards me, her arms lifting to wrap around my neck as my hands settled at her waist. “You know, I never took you for the sappy type, Tyson.”

“I prefer to think of myself as the sweet and romantic type,” I replied, my fingers lacing together at her lower back.

“Do you now?” she laughed, tugging playfully at the hair on the back of my head.

“Yep,” I smiled, leaning forward so my lips could brush against hers. “I do.”

The corners of her lips lifted even more as she closed the distance between us and we both smiled into the kiss.

If you had told me a year ago that there would ever be a time when I would be making out with Stella St. Clare in an apartment we shared while we raised a child together, I probably would have told you to keep dreaming. But it was almost effortless how easily Stella and I had made the transition from sort of friends to…well, whatever it was we were currently doing. We hadn’t really discussed it in detail, but as of right now, it consisted of a lot of kissing. We hadn’t gotten to the point where we were actually having s*x, but it was safe to say it was progressing in that direction.

Despite the fact that I had been the one who wanted to have the conversation about where our relationship was headed in the first place, I had been pretty relieved when Stella had jumped on confessing her feelings when we returned from Dallas. The two weeks since that fateful evening had been pretty blissful. Of course, we still verbally sparred because it wasn’t as though either of us had suddenly become less stubborn, but those arguments usually resulted in making up in the form of feverish kissing.

“Did you have a good day?” I asked when we pulled apart, feeling extremely warm and happy.

“Yeah,” she whispered, her smile small as she replied. “But I think tonight is gonna be even better.”

“Why is that?” I responded, though I knew exactly where her thought process was headed, which caused my heart rate to increase in excitement.

Her lips kinked into a smirk as she raised her chin to bring her lips to my ear, parting them to undoubtedly whisper something dirty, but before she could get a word out, a knock on the door pulled us from the moment.

“We have really shitty timing, don’t we?” she muttered in frustration as she dropped her hands from around my neck and stepped around me to answer.

I was silently thankful that my love of skinny jeans kept everything in place so that the new tightness in my crotch area wasn’t super noticeable as Stella pulled the door open to reveal Dani on the other side.

“Hey, girl,” Stella grinned, stepping aside to allow Dani to enter. The two of them had become quite good friends over the past couple months, which meant Stella was happy to see her, even if she had ruined the moment. “We’re just about to eat, do you wanna join?”

Wishing I could communicate with Stella telepathically to make it very clear that having guests was the opposite of what we wanted tonight, I found myself letting out a sigh of relief when Dani shook her head.

“No, thanks,” she replied, shooting me an apologetic glance for her next words. “I’m actually headed in to work.”

She still felt guilty that she worked at the restaurant while I had been fired, and I although I appreciated the sentiment, it wasn’t as though it was her fault. I knew she didn’t want to be a waitress forever, but she had to support herself somehow while she paid her way through law school. I shot her a smile to confirm that I wasn’t offended by the words and she continued. “I just dropped by to see if the three of you were free on Christmas Eve?”

Stella and I both lifted our eyebrows in surprise. There were a few times over the course of the past week where I had thought about suggesting that we spend Christmas in Australia because meeting Stella’s family had made me realize how much I missed my own, but I soon came to terms with the fact that it would be ridiculously expensive on such short notice, especially at this time of the year.

“I don’t think so,” Stella shook her head, pulling down the sleeves of her oversized sweater. “Why? What’s going on?”

“I’m having a party!” Dani replied brightly. “And I figured I’d stop by and make sure the two of you didn’t have hot dates or something.”

My cheeks instantly heated and I glanced at Stella to see that hers had done the same. Even if we weren’t doing whatever we were doing, we probably still would have spent the holidays together, but the mention of the word ‘date’ now that Stella and I were more than just friends made us both antsy. Or maybe the reason Stella was pressing her lips together to keep from smirking was because ‘hot date’ had her thinking about the plans she had made for us later this evening.

The thought of Stella and I wrapped in each other’s bodies caused my already tight jeans to tighten even more and I cleared my throat and smiled gratefully at Dani, so incredibly thankful that she couldn’t read minds.

“Thanks, Dan,” I nodded, crossing my arms over my chest and remaining behind the counter. “Sounds fun. We’ll be there.”

“Yeah,” Stella agreed with a wide grin, her gaze shifting to settle on Cooper. Twisting her torso, she slid across the wooden floor in her thick woolen socks, squatting down to lift the toddler into her arms, toy Mustang and all. “Hey, Coop, did you say hi to your Auntie Dani?”

“Hi!” Cooper said excitedly, waving his toy car in the air as his eyes settled on Dani. He’d grown quite fond of her after we’d begged her to babysit and Dani in turn had realized that kids were kinda alright, so she’d offered to look after him any time Stella and I needed some time off. His excitement wore off after about thirty seconds when his body seemed to realize it was time for bed and his head leaned against Stella’s shoulder, the smile still lingering on his lips.

“Hey, Coop!” Dani waved back, like most people, finding it difficult not to smile when those big blue eyes were looking at her. “Sweet dreams.”

“Ni, ni,” he whispered as Stella brushed back a stray curl from his forehead and kissed the top of his hair.

“I’ll put him to bed,” Stella offered, glancing at me to let me know as both she and Cooper waved goodbye to Dani. I nodded as she stepped towards me, Cooper still laden in her arms. “Say goodnight to Daddy, Coop.”

“Ni, Dada,” he said quietly, waving his small hand at me.

Smiling softly, I leaned over to kiss him on top of the head. “Night, Coop. Love you, buddy.”

Stella shot me a gently smile as she turned away, waving goodbye to Dani once more as she made her way to Cooper’s bedroom.

Dani kept her hand up and her lips stretched into a smile until the bedroom door closed behind the two of them, at which point, her gaze laser locked on me and her tone dropped to an urgent, hushed whisper. “What is going on with you two?”

“What are you talking about?” I asked, widening my eyes, my heart rate accelerating because I actually had a pretty good idea where the conversation was headed.

“You and Stella,” she urged, resting her forearms on the counter. “Something’s going on between the two of you. I saw the looks you were giving each other.”

My lips parted as I tried to explain, but the truth was that I myself had no idea what was happening, so there wasn’t anything to say. “We’re…”

“I knew it!” Dani gasped, her lips stretching into a wide smile. “I knew you were fucking.”

“We’re not!” I replied defensively because it was technically true.

“You’re not sleeping together?” she raised her eyebrows in surprise.

“We haven’t,” I shook my head, uncrossing my arms and reaching one hand up to tug at my curls.

“But you want to…”

“Well…yeah,” I sighed, knowing that denial was only going to prolong the conversation and if Stella and I were going to have a ‘hot date’, I needed Dani gone sooner rather than later.

“Damn, Kingsley, you got it bad, don’t you?”

It was my turn to be surprised. “What do you mean?”

“I mean; you’re blushing at the thought of sleeping with Stella. You really like her.” The smirk kinking Dani’s lips was too smug for her own good.

“Ok, fine,” I sighed heavily again. “I like her. A lot.”

“Well, that was easier than I thought it would be,” she laughed, her eyes crinkling closed. “I gotta get to work. You kids have fun!”

Before I could protest, she had stepped into the hallway and shut the door behind her, leaving me in the kitchen, alone and completely confused. I wasn’t entirely sure what it was that I’d just admitted. Part of me wanted to think that I just said what I said to get Dani off my back, but another part of me knew that saying I liked Stella a lot was just me being honest.

Because the truth was that I’d always liked Stella. Even when she annoyed the s**t out of me, being around her had always been entertaining. Up until we were forced permanently into each other’s lives, I had hidden the fact that I liked her behind a wall of sarcasm because, to be honest, the verbal spats we had were kind of fun.

We’d toned it down a lot once we realized that constantly arguing around Cooper wasn’t a healthy way to raise them and I had been pleasantly surprised to discover that being friends with Stella was pretty great as well.

So my fondness of getting her riled up had transformed into a fondness of seeing her happy and now, more often than not, I found myself just wanting to make her smile. I just hadn’t figured out what that meant yet.

Cooper’s bedroom door opened a few minutes later and Stella emerged, shutting it quietly behind her before padding over to meet me in the kitchen.

“That was so fast,” I raised my eyebrows in surprise because the last time I had put Cooper to bed it had taken me a good half hour. But Stella never had that problem. When she did it, he was out in a few minutes. “How do you do that?”

“It’s a gift,” she smirked, shrugging as she rested her forearms on the counter to my right. “When did Dani leave?”

“A few minutes ago,” I replied, glancing towards the door, our conversation still running through my mind as I mimicked Stella’s position on the counter. “She had to go to work.”

Nodding, Stella sucked her lips into her mouth and pushed them back out again, her gaze lifting to meet mine slowly. “Are you alright? About not working?”

We hadn’t really talked about my unemployment since it happened. Stella had been busy with promotion for her brand, which was perfect since I now had a lot more free time. I hadn’t been completely unproductive, though. I had reached out to some of my friends from Pavarotti’s and asked if they knew of any other restaurants that were hiring.

I’d gotten a few interviews because working for Carlo was a huge endorsement and now I was just waiting to hear back. Because of my schedule with Stella where she worked during the day, I’d had to take Cooper along to a few of them, but I figured that was a plus, because it showed where my priorities lay. Cooper was always going to come first, and any of my future employers needed to be aware of that fact.

“Yeah, it’s alright,” I laughed quietly, shrugging my shoulders and lacing my fingers together atop the counter. “Carlo was a jackass anyway.”

“Yeah, I gathered that much,” Stella smiled widely. She pushed herself off the counter and stepped towards me, her arms wrapping around my shoulders from the side as she rubbed her nose against my cheek, causing me to smile. “You’re a pretty amazing chef, Ty. You’ll find what you’re looking for.”

My smile widened as she kissed my cheek and as I turned to face her, she gave me an innocent look and dropped her arms from my shoulders, crossing them over her chest as she shrugged. “What?”

“Nothing,” I shook my head, reaching up to tug my fingers through my hair. “I’m just a little thrown off my how nice and supportive you’re being.”

That wasn’t entirely true, because it turned out Stella was actually a pretty great friend, but the fact that I enjoyed verbally sparring with her hadn’t changed, no matter our relationship status.

Her eyes glinted wickedly, her lips kinking into a small smirk as she replied. “It’s because I’m trying to get in your pants.”

Perhaps her response shouldn’t have surprised me as much as it did because Stella had never been one to beat around the bush when it came to something she wanted. My smirk soon matched hers and I lifted one eyebrow as I took a small step towards her. “Oh really? Because that can be arranged.”

Before either of us could overthink the situation, Stella’s smile had widened and she leaned towards me, our lips pressing together feverishly a split second later. My arms wrapped around her waist and her fingers soon found themselves tangled in my hair and the next few minutes consisted of me walking her backwards towards my bedroom and frantically trying to remove each other’s clothing as we found the bed. The physical contact only paused for a few seconds while Stella kicked off her underwear and I rolled to the side to pull a condom from the bedside table and then our hands were all over each other again.

I’d be lying if I said I never imagined what having s*x with Stella would be like. In my fantasies it was wild and crazy, with a lot of hair pulling and cursing and gasping and maybe a little biting. The reality was actually much the same, with one addition: we ended up laughing quite a bit. Every instance in which the situation could have become awkward, such as when I hit my head against the headboard or we nearly rolled off the bed, ended with us unable to control our laughter.

There had been so much tension between us for so long that maybe there should have been expectations, but everything happened so naturally that it felt like we’d known each other’s bodies for years. Still, the sight of Stella’s bright eyes and that playful smile on her lips as she sat in my lap and moved her hips back and forth was one I knew I’d never forget.

Afterwards, there was only few minutes of awkward panting as we lay side by side and tried to fully understand what had just happened before Stella’s stomach growled and we realized we had completely forgotten about dinner. I tossed her one of my many plaid shirts to wear before pulling on a clean set of boxers and shuffling out to the kitchen to heap warm the spaghetti and meat sauce for a few minutes. Once they were steaming, I served helpings of both onto two separate plates, grabbed forks from the drawer where we kept the utensils and made my way back into the bedroom, where Stella was sitting up and leaning back against the headboard.

“That smells amazing,” she inhaled deeply, smiling gratefully as I placed a knee on the bed and leaned over to hand her one of the plates with a fork on top. “Thank you.”

“No worries,” I lifted the corners of my lips into a smile, leaning in to kiss her softly on the lips before settling back against the headboard beside her, my legs outstretched and crossed at the ankles.

We twirled spaghetti around our forks and stuffed the meat sauce covered pasta into our mouths and talked about our days, complete with Stella’s impersonations of the crazy photographer she’d worked with and the entire time, I couldn’t shake off one recurring, equally frightening, equally exhilarating thought: I could get used to this.