Page 72 of All Your Dreams

She sets her brush down, grabs the baby monitor and follows me to the hallway outside the apartment. Opening the second door, I step into my little oasis and flick on the light. Dust motes dance in the air and the room carries the earthy scent of clay. My wheel sits where I left it a few weeks ago, untouched since Tilly arrived. Nothing has changed, yet at the same time, everything has.

Peyton inspects the space, awe evident in her expression. Her focus lingers on the shelves lining the walls, filled with uneven mugs, bowls with cracked glaze and half-finished sculptures—pieces of me sitting out in the open.

I roll up my sleeves and head to the corner where I keep all the supplies. The clay is cool when I wedge it, before pressing and folding the clump on the table. There’s something satisfying about forcing air out and making the material ready for whatever I want to make today.

Setting it on the wheel, I take a seat and relax my shoulders. My foot finds the pedal on instinct. The familiar vibration travels up through my leg as I press down on it. My hands sink into the piece and everything else goes quiet. There’s no shop, no missing sister, no countdown to Peyton’s annulment. Nothing.

My palms are slick and clay smears up to my wrists. I breathe through my nose, focusing on the way my hands can shape something messy into something neat. It’s the closest thing to control I’ve had in close to a month.

Soft footsteps behind me break through the stillness around me. “What are you making?”

“I don’t know yet,” I answer.

The shape starts forming under my hands and I think of my options. A bowl, maybe. No. A cup. A teacup for Peyton. She would love it. I picture her wrapping both hands around it on an early morning, still half asleep behind her glasses.

“Can I try?” she asks after a while.

My foot eases off the pedal and the wheel slows to a stop. Letting her into my safe space feels less like giving something away and more like sharing a part of myself.

I pat the stool in front of me. “C'mere.”

Peyton takes a seat between my knees, filling my nose with her lavender scent. My body reacts to her nearness and I will my damn dick to calm down. But it’s a losing battle with her so close. Especially after last night holding her hand across the restaurant table, imagining how easy it could be to keep doing so forever.

“Put your hands right here,” I say, placing them around the clay. The touch is innocent, but my nerve endings light up anyway. When I press the pedal, the wheel spins again. Peyton’s hands tremble at first, then settle.

“The whole thing is going to cave in,” she comments. “I’m going to ruin it.”

“Not if you stop fighting the movement.”

She exhales a soft breath. “The last time I loosened my grip on what mattered, everything fell apart. Ever since then, I've needed to feel like I'm in control.”

The words land heavier than she probably intends them to. Because I know exactly where that need comes from. The feeling of your life slipping sideways once before and desperately trying to stop the same from happening again.

“Sometimes being in control means knowing when to let go,” I say softly, reminding both her and myself. “When we stop chasing perfection and loosen our grip, we give ourselves room to adapt. We stop fighting what’s in front of us and start working with it instead, taking the hand we’ve been dealt, making the best of it.”

Peyton stares at the spinning clay. “Maybe…” She swallows. “Maybe I don't remember how.”

“Then let me remind you.”

My hands settle over hers again, guiding instead of correcting. Clay slips between our fingers, cool and slick, while the wheel spins steadily beneath them. Her muscles loosen and she leans into the motion. Into me. Her back brushes my chest and my brain short-circuits before I force myself to focus. I pray Peyton doesn’t feel what she’s doing to me. But judging by the hitch in her breathing, she absolutely does.

“Gentler,” I say in a low rasp.

She eases the pressure beneath her fingertips. “Like this?”

“Exactly.”

A small fleck of clay splats upward and lands on her cheek. Peyton startles and chuckles under her breath, the breathy sound destroying what little self-control I have left. I still somehow manage to stop the wheel. She turns her head at the same time my thumb reaches up to brush her cheek, trying to wipe the stain away. It smears instead.

Peyton’s eyes lift to mine, wide behind her glasses, and I’m painfully aware of every single detail I tried to ignore. The way her breath catches. How close our mouths are. Her intoxicating scent. The wheel has stopped spinning, but everything inside me is still moving.

I want to close the distance and kiss her properly, to finally stop pretending we don’t both feel the pull. I want to kiss her until neither of us remembers why we were waiting in the first place. Instead, I lean forward and press a slow, restrained kiss to her forehead. Her eyes flutter closed and the reaction nearly kills me on the spot.

When I pull back, my face lingers near hers before I force space between us. “Soon,” I mutter and get up.

Her breath leaves in a rush. “Soon,” she repeats.

I don’t say anything else as I leave the room and go to take a cold shower, my hand wrapped around myself the entire time, dreaming it’s her mouth instead.