Ezra shrugs broad, naked shoulders. “He’s pretty mature, unusually intelligent and open in a way that most kids aren’t at his age. I think it helped that we never had a conventional relationship, never married. It has been an adjustment not seeing him quite as much. I mean, I’m around the corner, so I still see him every day, all the time, but it’s different when you don’t live under the same roof. He’s with me a few days and with Ko the others. It works, but I’m always checking in with him, getting him to talk and tell me how he’s doing.”

I watch the man I love, the man I’ve known since he was a child, an awkward boy finding himself. I know him so well, and never have I seen him more in need of a pocket to shove his hand into.

Except he’s nude.

He clears his throat, and some of the red that used to crawl over his cheeks all the time colors his neck. “So I thought now that my…situation is settled and the governor’s race is over, maybe we could discuss our future.”

I open my mouth and he rushes on before I can speak.

“First of all, if you want a baby, I do, too. Natural. Frozen eggs. IVF. I don’t care. I want to make you happy, Tru.”

I stare at the rugged symmetry of his features, the prominent nose and sculpted lips. The dark wing of his brows over African violet eyes. The cap of clipped curls. I remember this man as a boy, the awkward, lanky, too-big-for-his-body parts boy. He had to grow into the beauty of his face. I’ve seen the arc of his life, how he developed over time. Emotion scalds my throat and my lips tremble. Before I even knew how babies were made, I imagined ours.

“I would love to…” He clears his throat again. “I was hoping you’d consider…oh, hell.”

He reaches to the floor and pulls up a black velvet box. My wide eyes connect with his, and we both swallow hard, on the cusp of something I wasn’t sure would ever happen. He opens the box and I’m so shocked by what’s in there, I laugh.

In the slit where a ring would normally be is the tab of a can.

“I was hoping you’d consider,” he repeats, “marrying me again.”

Again.

The years fall away, and we’re those kids standing under an elm tree in the Sterns’ backyard, laughing at shattered glass and sealed by vows we didn’t understand. It’s painfully sweet, that memory wrapping around my battered heart. As sweet as a million moments we shared before we could possibly grasp how rare and precious it was, what we had. We were each other’s light and solace.

Hazak, Hazak, Venithazek.