I loved all of that, too, but it didn’t change that I wanted more. “Is that all you’ll ever want? No building a home together, making a family?” I didn’t need a ring, but I did need him. And in a way where he was fully present and in it with me.

Crosby stiffened. “I told you when we started this that I’m not a forever and picket fences kind of guy. It’s not what I want for my life. But I do want you.”

Pressure gathered behind my eyes. “I don’t care about picket fences, but I do care about forever.”

Crosby’s hands around me spasmed. “Can’t we just take things one day at a time? Why do you have to put all of this pressure on me all of a sudden?”

I stepped out of Crosby’s hold, his words stinging. “It’s not pressure. It’s telling you what I want, what I need. If you get to express what you want out of life, then so do I. But we have to be real with each other. What each of us wants might not match up.”

A muscle in Crosby’s cheek ticked as he rubbed the back of his neck. “This feels a hell of a lot like an ultimatum. Sign on the dotted line for marriage and babies, or you’re gone. How is that fair? I care about you, Kenna. I—”

Crosby stopped short, not finishing that thought. It was the symbol of all we were. He might love me. But he couldn’t say the words. He wanted me in his life. But he always had to have that escape hatch. It tore at something deep inside, not only for myself but also for Crosby. I had played the wishing game before, hoping that a man would change his ways. It hadn’t worked out well for me then, and I refused to do it again.

I reached out, lacing my fingers with Crosby’s, his rough palm against my smooth. The juxtaposition had always soothed something in me. I looked into his endless brown eyes. “Life is messy and terrifying, but it is also crazy beautiful. You taught me that. You showed me that my wreckage could be perfect in its own way, that all those little cracks in my soul just made me stronger, more beautiful. Truly and authentically me. You taught me what it means to truly live.”