Alexander and I lay in the bed in the evening, watching the stars through the window above us. I have my head on his bare chest and his hand is caressing my arm. Up and down in calming moves. None of us is talking, both of us too busy in our own thoughts.

I can feel Alexander's thinking about something heavy because his heart is beating fast and he's not relaxed. He's miles away in his mind. But so am I.

I break the moment by turning my head to look up at him, keeping my head on his chest. "What are you thinking about?" I ask him.

He looks at me, giving me a small smile. "You. Always you," he says.

I smile, but I know it's not the case. Or at least I doubt it's only me. "Charmer," I reply.

He takes a deep breath. "I was thinking about my sister actually. Zoe."

My body involuntarily tenses up. Alexander never talks about her. He has never really opened up about her and whenever I asked him about her, he shut down completely. This is the part of him that remains locked inside and he doesn't want to let it out. "What about her?" I ask him, trying to keep my voice neutral. I don't want to sound too eager, even though I am. But I really don't want to force him to talk.

"I don't ... I don't remember much about her, I guess. Just some little things. She liked looking up at the stars. We slept outside in our backyard once on just a blanket, placed on the grass. She was asking me about all the stars and I knew shit about them," he confesses.

My heart squeezes when I imagine him with his little sister back then. Although he wasn't like that with Amelia at the beginning, he changed and started acting differently. I know he was just afraid of losing his sister again because he blamed himself for what happened to Zoe.

I nuzzle my head against his chest, not saying anything because I don't know what to say. It's one of the rare moments he opened up and talked about her and I don't want to ruin it by saying something meaningless.

"I dream about her sometimes," he admits quietly. "I don't know whether I dream about things that happened or they're just dreams. It's blurred sometimes and it pisses me off that I don't remember more about her." He sighs. "I truly, truly adored her, you know? She was ... I've wanted a sibling for so long and when she was born ... she was perfect. Annoying at times, but still perfect. I miss her so much. I often wonder where she'd be today, you know? Or later in her life."

I squeeze my eyes shut because I'm going to start crying and I don't want him to stop talking. But I can't listen to him without feeling anything. The emotion he tells me this with is so strong ... It makes my heart break. It's so unfair what happened to him – to her. It makes me so, so sad.

He sighs again and squeezes me against him, placing his lips on top of my head and resting his head there. "She would've adored you," he says, changing the direction of the conversation suddenly.

"Yeah?" I whisper because if I said anything loud out, my voice would crack and break and I would definitely start full-out crying for him.

"Yeah," he confirms. "Just like everyone else does."

I can't turn my head to look at him. "I know she would've loved you," I say.

There's a long silence before he speaks again. "You think?" He sounds unsure.

I move my head to look at him this time and a tear falls from the corner of my eye suddenly. Alexander sees it and quietly wipes it away. "I know," I say, meaning it from the bottom of my heart.

He tightens his arm around me. Moments of silence pass between us, both of us just enjoying the stillness around us. We're both tired from today's adventure. We went out in the afternoon and walked around. I didn't feel how tired I was until we came back and the sun already started to set.

"I don't think I want to have children," Alexander suddenly says, breaking the silence.

My body stiffens. That was so out of nowhere, it takes me by surprise. I need a few moments to process his words and then another few to think about what I want to say to this. "You don't?" I ask because, honestly, I don't know what else to answer to that.

"I don't think I do, no," he says.

"Oh," I say, clamping my mouth shut.

I don't know where this is all coming from right now, because I've always thought he'd like to have his own children one day, maybe in a few years. I even joked about it once and he said nothing. And seeing how he is with Amelia and Clara made me think he's going to be a great father one day.

"Gabby?"

"Yes?" I say quietly.

"Is this going to be a problem for you? I know you want to have them."

I swallow painfully. I want to say, no, it's okay. That I could live with it. Because, right now, it's okay. I don't want them right now. But I've always dreamed about having my own children because I love them and because I want to give them a life I've never had. So, no. It's not completely okay because if I think about the future, I would probably not be okay with it.

But do I love Alexander more than my want for having children? Heck yeah. With no doubt. I know it'd be hard to sacrifice something to gain something else, but what can I do? I can't force him to have children with me. I would never put that on him.

And I'm also happy he brought this up and we're talking about it instead of just living with assumption. Or maybe living with a hope that he'll change his mind one day and until then, I'd just have to wait.

"I mean ..." I start, not knowing how to really start. I move away from him and sit up on the bed, leaning against the headboard. He does the same, expectantly looking at me. "You don't want them now and in a few years or not at all?"

He sighs. "Not at all."

"Oh," I say again, feeling my stomach drop. I look down at my hands.

"Gabby?" he says again, his voice desperate.

"I'm just ... I'm thinking. I've always wanted children and I thought we were on the same board, but ... Does this have anything to do with Zoe?" I can't help but ask.

He rakes his hand through the hair, frowning. "Yeah, probably. I just don't see myself with kids and when I think about it I just ... panic."

"Okay," I say, nodding. "Okay," I say again. "This took me by surprise a little. I understand and respect your decision, but can you please talk to the therapist about this? If you'll still feel the same about it later, I will be able to accept it. We could always have a dog." I try to lighten up the mood.

He grimaces. "Not really a fan of those?"

My face falls. "Of dogs?" Seriously? I remember Amelia telling me they don't own a dog because Alexander didn't want it. But ... seriously? Who doesn't like dogs? My boyfriend, apparently.

He nods.

"Maybe a cat, then," I try.

He shrugs. "Cats are assholes."

I just stare at him for a few minutes, waiting for him to say he's kidding. He doesn't. "Oh, God. You're serious, aren't you? Well, I'd like to have a pet," I say. He'll have to suck it up because I'm not caving in with this. No children, no pets ... I don't want to have such a boring life.

"Okay, maybe we can have a hamster ... or something," he says, shrugging again.

My eyes bug out. And then I sigh. "What about a pig?" My eyes light up.

Alexander's not so much. His eyebrows knit together. "For ... eating?" he asks unsurely.

This man is completely hopeless. "Alex ..." I chide, shaking my head. "Well, I want something, so you'll either decide with me or I'm going to decide by myself."

"I told you we could get a hamster. Those are actually cute."

I scowl. But then my face brightens. "What about a parrot? Those are small."

Alexander grimaces. "But they're really loud," Alexander says.

I sigh hopelessly. "We'll talk about this later, in some years probably. So you have some time to think about what pet you'd like to have more." When he wants to protest, I stop him. "If you're not giving me a baby, you're at least giving me a pet or else this really won't work ..."

He shuts up immediately. "Alright," he agrees with not much thinking. "A pet at least. Got it," he says gruffly.

I nudge him in the shoulder, smiling big. "It's going to be so cool! You'll see," I say excitedly. I've always wanted to have my own pet. I'd love to have a dog because I just adore them. Alexander isn't so excited about it and I just roll my eyes. "You could always get a new girlfriend."

He frowns so hard that I have to hold myself back from bursting out laughing. I'm only teasing him because it's fun sometimes. He takes it all so seriously. "Where the fuck did that come from?" His voice is low and dark and I find he doesn't find this funny or amusing at all.

"Uh. It was just a joke. I was joking," I rush, my eyes widening.

He looks away from me. "Well, don't fucking joke about things like that."

O-kay. I nudge his shoulder. "Lighten up, buddy," I say teasingly. I'm feeling playful tonight and when I see he takes everything so seriously, it makes it even better for me to tease him.

He looks at me. "Buddy?" he asks lowly, testing the word out as if it was something foreign.

I just chuckle. "By the way, what nicknames did your previous girlfriends call you? Did you make them call you Sin?" I tease him, but a part of me always wanted to know this since he was all about "Call me Sin and nothing else" when I moved in with his family.

"Girlfriends?" Alexander questions, raising his eyebrows.

"Yeah. You know ... girls before me?"

Alexander just looks at me weirdly. "Never had a girl before you," he grunts.

"Uhm, what?" I scrunch my nose up at him. "You literally dated someone when I came here. What was her name? Sophie?" I search my brain for a name. I briefly remember how she looked. I wasn't paying that much attention to him at the time because I wanted to avoid him at all times.

His mouth quirks up. "I just had girls I occasionally fuc– slept with."

"Your mother met her, though?"

He shrugs. "Bound to happen. She came to my house and we ... hung out."

I grimace, already regretting I brought this up. I'm changing my mind; I don't want to know anything about the girls Alexander used to hang out with. But to think about it, it makes sense. I'm his first girlfriend and he's still trying to get the hang of it because he's not used to this. He never had it before me and it's only natural for both of us to mess things up here and there.

"Why are we even talking about this?" Alexander asks, putting his hands behind his head and my eyes immediately go to his biceps. He's got more muscles now and it's well-appreciated from me. It doesn't go unnoticed.

"Just things I've been wondering around." I put my hand on his chest again, sighing tiredly. "We should go to sleep. It's late and we're going to have a long day tomorrow because I want to see as much of this place as I can."

Alexander's hand goes to my hair, settling on the nape of my neck. "Are you mad?" he asks.

I move my head to look at him. "No. Why?"

I feel him shrug. "Don't know ... Because of the conversation we just had?"

He thinks I'm mad because he did things before he met me? "I'm not mad. I'm just glad I'm your first, actually."

A low chuckle comes from his throat. "And my last," he promises, kissing the top of my head.

˙˙˙

On the last day of our little weekend getaway, we do some more sightseeing. We go to Snowshill Manor and Garden and I just can't get over the beauty of this place. It's magnificent. The best thing I've ever seen in my life and I just can't stop gushing about it.

Even Alexander's mood is light and he's more relaxed than I've ever seen him. We both needed this alone time; just us and nothing else. None of our problems existed this weekend. I don't want to leave because I don't want this feeling to ever go away.

On our ride way back, Alexander opens the window on his side and lights a cigarette. I look at him and frown.

He notices me staring and he turns his head and his face falls. "Oh, fuck," he says. "You have that face."

"What face?" I ask in a flat tone.

He's already shaking his head. "Nope. you better not be starting shit, Gabby, because we're not ruining our weekend."

I cross my arms over my chest. "I don't like when you smoke around me. You know that," I point out. "You haven't smoked the whole weekend, by the way."

He shrugs. "This is just a habit, babe. Don't take it to heart."

"Well, it's a bad one," I mutter. I don't think I'll ever grow to like the cigarette smoke. I try not to nag him about it too much because I know it's useless and he'll do whatever he wants, but I really hate it when he smokes around me. He knows that.

He puts the cigarette out with a long sigh, closing the window. I feel the mood shift immediately and this is what I feared. That as soon as we'd leave, our bubble of happiness would burst.

"What, now? You're going to sulk about this? Shit, babe. I've been smoking for years. Why do you get mad about it every time?"

I sigh, rubbing the side of my head. "I don't get mad, it's just ... I don't like it. Besides, it's weird that you're smoking since you're visiting the gym regularly and trying to eat healthier. Doesn't it bother you?"

"And you don't want me doing it. Got it." When I look at him, I see his jaw tick. He doesn't comment on the gym thing and I know he's getting irritated.

Great.

I put my hand on his thigh, immediately feeling how tight his muscles are. "I'm not trying to fight," I say softly, truly meaning it. "I just commented on it. You can smoke, but could you at least not do it when I'm in the car with you?"

He lets out a breath, putting his hand on top of mine. "Yeah. I'm sorry," he says, turning his head and looking at me. "I just did it out of habit and not on purpose. I know how much you hate it." I see he's sincere.

I just nod, letting him know he's forgiven. Because, honestly, it'd be stupid to hold a grudge for something like this. "Hey, can we go get some ice-cream on our way home? And pizza? Or a hamburger?" My face lights up, my stomach letting me know that it wants all of the food mentioned.

Alexander chuckles. "Sure."

Food is always our peacemaker. Or it is mine, at least. He can buy me with food any time and I'd pretty much let him get away with anything. Well, almost anything.

* 

Like some of you already saw on twitter: A Taste of Sin #3 is coming in September (hopefully) on radish and on wattpad in 2022.

I know the wait seems long and all buuuut, I'll be posting a brand new story in March which will be radish exclusive (&free!!) & I'll post more information on twitter with maybe some teasers ... :)