Page 26 of Keystrokes and Kittens

Well, very hard. In fact, I wasn’t entirely certain I could manage.

My alarm sounded.

Soren was up and snagging my empty bowl.

I hadn’t even realized I’d eaten all the sorbet. The sorbet he’d gone out of his way to get for me. The perfect treat at the end of a very long week.

“I’ll bring the bottles. Just relax.” With that, he was gone. With darling Tibby hard on his heels. We were lucky she was such a great dog. Otherwise, caring for the kittens would’ve been a nightmare.

By the time Soren was back with three bottles, Peaches was yowling.

He put one bottle on the side table, handed one to me, and kept one for himself. He smiled. “What do you think?”

“Maybe you take Peaches? I want to take a look at Carlos. He doesn’t seem to be as big as the others.”

“Yeah, I noticed that as well. We just need to fatten him up.” Soren continued to smile as he opened the crate and snagged our cantankerous girl. Well, in her defense, she only squawked when she was hungry—which was, admittedly, most of the time.

Soren settled on the other side of the sofa with Peaches while I tucked Carlos against me and offered the bottle. I had to adjust it several times before he finally started to drink. I gazed at Peaches. “You’ll likely be finished before I get half of this into your brother.”

“Well, then, I’ll feed Jack and we’ll all be good.” Soren stroked Peaches’s head. “She really is quite the fierce warrior.”

“As long as she doesn’t take out that ferocity on her brothers. I think we’ll need to feed them all separately when they go on wet food. Otherwise, I can see her eating everything.”

“Yep, that pretty much sums her up.” Soren grinned. “I love her feistiness. That despite her beginnings in life, she’s tackling everything with zeal.”

I nudged Carlos to keep drinking. Was he falling asleep? I couldn’t be certain. I took a deep breath. “So, uh, Christmas…”

Soren pivoted his attention to me. Or at least that’s what I interpreted from the movement I caught out of the corner of my eye. I didn’t look at him. I did, however, take another deep breath. “So there’s something you should know about me.”

“Only if you want to share.” His voice was soft. “This isn’t meant to be…painful. If I need to apologize, I’m happy to do that. Obviously, I read the signals wrong. I—”

“Stop.” I said the word a little more forcefully than I planned, but I needed him to understand. “Sorry.”

“No worries.” He murmured the words.

“This is hard for me.” I waited, but when he didn’t speak, I continued. “See, I’m sort of inexperienced.” Finally, I gazed over at him. “Which you probably already knew.”

He held my gaze. “I might’ve had an inkling—but I’d never want to assume.”

“Yeah. Thank you for that. Just…with all that’s been going on in my life, dating and sex have been a low priority. I wasn’t out in high school, and sort of avoided girls. I had plans to come out to my family at the end of my first year of college. Then the accident—” I winced. “The accident was at Christmas. I never went back.”

“That’s unfortunate.”

I shrugged. “Quinta needed me. Not a moment’s hesitation on my part. I just quit school and dug in. Did what she needed. Well, after I recovered, that is.”

“Must’ve been tough.”

I nudged Carlos again. “Keep eating, buddy. Peaches is finished and Jack’s starting.” While I’d been trying to figure out the right words, Soren had completed taking care of Peaches and was now starting in with Jack.

“He okay?”

“Uh.” I stroked Carlos’s soft fur. “I think so?” When he started sucking again, I continued. “So, dating wasn’t a priority. Eventually, though, I thought I should try. To show Quinta that life moved on. Plus, I was damn lonely.”

“I can imagine. How did it go?”

“Well…I won’t say a disaster because that would be too optimistic.”

“Damn.”