*

It's been three days of bliss.

My family can be pretty intense and as much as I love them, they can be a bit much after a few days of my brothers ribbing me and my sisters bugging me, but Storie takes the edge off. I thought she was going to leave on the 26th, but she didn't. And she didn't leave on the 27th, either. Or the 28th, when she borrowed clothes from Mom.

Now, two days before New Year's Eve, the clock on our time in this family bubble has run down, and I'm about to break a promise.

I told Mom I'd be staying here until the new year, but I wasn't expecting Storie to turn up on the doorstep and spend three whole days with me and my family, and I can't let her go back to her family alone. So I'm going to be her passenger for the nearly three hundred mile trip to the other end of Ohio. Five Oaks is almost as north as you can go, nestled right on the coast of Lake Erie, and it's where I'm going to spend the next few days.

"Have you got gas?" I ask as I dig out a week's worth of underwear, just in case. Mom brought in a basket of freshly laundered clothes this morning and I felt like a teenager again.

Storie, brushing her hair, meets my eye in the mirror. "Enough to get to a gas station," she says. "I don't want to leave any later than six, in case we hit traffic."

I check my phone. Five thirty. "That can be arranged," I say, getting up off my bed to plant a kiss on her cheek. She smells insatiable, her skin warm to the touch, and I count my lucky stars to know her again. "I'm gonna put our things in the car."

She gives me her key and I sling our bags over my shoulder, and my heart grows heavy with the realization that I have to break it to Daria that I'm leaving again. She's spent the last few days all over me, making up for lost time, and I hate to see her sad. I manage to slip out of the house without her noticing, but she hears the slam of the trunk and then the click of the front door, and when I come back inside, she's standing in the hallway.

"Liam."

"Hey, Dar." I give her my biggest grin. She doesn't return it. Instead, she folds her skinny arms and pouts at me, the kind of look only a kid her age can pull off.

"Are you leaving?"

"Storie and I are getting ready to head to her parents' place," I try, in an attempt to soften the yes. "She came here for a few days, and I'm gonna go with her for a few days."

Her pout deepens, the corners of her mouth dipping down further, and she dips her head so blonde waves fall forwards. "But you only just got here, Willy. I don't want you to go. I like when everyone's here."

"I know, Dar. It's really awesome being home," I say, and I hold out my arms as I walk towards her, like I'm approaching a scared animal. She lets me hug her, and after a moment of reluctance, she wraps her arms tight around my waist. "But I can't stay forever. I need to go back to my place eventually."

And then I remember – my place isn't that shitty little studio anymore. Not after the first of January, anyway. My plans for New Year's Day, aside from starting a new year with the love of my life, are to empty my apartment of the few belongings I keep there, and move into Storie's place.

Our place.

I still can't believe it. Can't quite fathom how different my life is now from what it was just a couple weeks ago. Somehow I've gone from ugly, lonely despair to love and bliss and all things good, all the things I've been missing out on. All because I fell asleep on the red line and found an ad in a random Starbucks, and took on a weird ass job in a weird ass Winter Wonderland.

"Are you gonna come back again though?" Daria asks, wriggling out of the hug to look at me.

"At some point, yeah, absolutely. I'm not going forever, Dar." I ruffle her unbrushed hair. "And you know what? You're gonna have to come visit me in my new place!"

That perks her up. Her cheeks pinken when she grins and says, "With Storie!"

"Yup!"

"If you live together, are you getting married too?" she asks, and instead of deflection, I just shrug this time. I've had this question a lot since I came home. Even more since I announced that I'm moving in with Storie – the moment she left the room to go to the bathroom, I got pounced on by a million questions from my siblings, and a hundred from Mom.

Dad didn't ask me anything. He just smiled, and nodded, and said, "Good for you, Liam. I think this is a very positive move for the two of you."

I won't lie, it hits me right in my feelings every time he calls me Liam. It's only taken him, like, twenty-five years to realize I way prefer it to William.

I'm also not gonna pretend that I haven't idly pondered the idea of marriage each time someone brings it up. I know it's crazy early days, but I also know I don't want to ever be without Storie. I want to spend my life with her, and I hope she wants to spend her life with me too. I'm not a dumb, thoughtless kid anymore – I know without doubt that she is the best thing in my life. And when – if, I suppose – I know she feels the same, then I'll ask. But not until I'm sure.

Daria follows me up to my room and jumps on my bed, her huge blue eyes trained on Storie. "You're so pretty, Storie," she says, ogling as Storie trains her hair into one long plait.

Storie grins and ties off the braid, and she sits next to Daria. "Thank you, Daria. So are you. Such a cute little patootie!" she says, scooping Daria into a tight hug that makes her laugh. "I'm gonna miss you, Dar. I like having a little sister – two little sisters. Where's Anna?"

"She's with Daddy. They're doing puzzles."

I wish the dad I grew up with had been the type to do puzzles with me. When I was Anna's age, Dad was younger than I am now and yet even then, he seemed old and serious, always busy, always working. I know it was for the best, that he has worked his ass off to get to where he is, to make the money he makes to provide for us, but I can't help the thread of envy when I see how he is with the girls.

But one thing I've seen these last couple weeks is that it's not too late. I don't think so, anyway. There's time for us to make the effort, to forge a new relationship, and I'm determined to put the work in. When I have kids someday, I don't want them to fear him: I want them to love spending time with their grandad.

"Time to go soon," I say when there's a lull in Daria and Storie's rabbiting conversation. "I think we need to allow a good ten minutes for protracted goodbyes."

Storie chuckles and gets up, pulling her plait over her shoulder and then pushing it back, adjusting the tie on the end until it's the perfect tightness. Daria stands on the bed, her hands up.

"Can you give me a piggyback?" she asks, and I let her hop on my back because I don't know how long it'll be before I'm back, so I want to leave her with a grin. With her on my back, her arms wrapped around my neck like she's younger than seven, we head downstairs to where my parents and Anna are in the conservatory, black night pouring through the windows.

Despite all the glass, it's toasty in here, underfloor heating pumping warmth beneath the tiles, and Mom's dressed in a woolly hoodie and sweatpants. Anna's bundled up in her pyjamas, ready for bed in an hour, and I struggle to contain my surprise when I see that Dad's wearing a Christmas sweater and jeans. I don't think I've ever seen him in jeans. I didn't think he owned any.

Mom looks up when she hears us, her natural smile fading. "Uh oh. Is it that time already?" she asks, looking from me to Storie and back again.

"I'm afraid so, Allie," Storie says. "I've absolutely loved staying with you guys – you've been so welcoming, as always. I can't tell you how much it means to me."

"Oh, honey." Mom scoots her chair back and hurries over, pulling Storie into a hug. "You know how much we adore you. You're always welcome here, for as long as you want. It's been so wonderful to have you here; I'm so glad you're back in our lives."

When she lets go, she looks at me, and I see the realization in her eyes, which mutes into understanding.

"You're going too, are you, sweetie?" she asks, her hand on my elbow.

"Yeah. I hope that's okay. I know I said I'd stay until New Ye—"

"Oh, shush!" She laughs and rolls her eyes at me, shaking her head. "Liam, it's been so nice to have you these past few days. You know how much I love having all of you back in the nest. Don't feel bad about going with your girlfriend. I'm sure her family wants to spend time with you as much as I love spending time with Storie."

What she doesn't say, but what I'm sure is implicit in her sentiment, is that I need to spend time with Storie's family, if I'm going to work myself back into their favour. They may say they've accepted me back, but I know I have a lot of work to do to prove my worth to them. I know I shattered their trust, and I fully expect that to be harder to earn back than it was with Storie. I'm going to need every moment I can get.

"Mmm," Storie hums. "My parents are really looking forward to getting to know Liam better. Especially now that we're moving in together." With a laugh, she adds, "Tad might put you through the third degree – though I don't think he'll quite stretch to a questionnaire."

With that, she glances at my dad, with a grin on her face, and he smiles in return.

"The questionnaire," he says, referring to a form he gave to Storie the first time I brought her over, "was only ever meant in good humor."

"I know. It amused me," she says. "I'm not entirely sure I filled it out honestly, I must admit."

There's a glint in Dad's eye. "No, I don't think you did," he says, and then he makes a sound that I think is a laugh. Wow. "Unless you really are a regular drug taker who had had, what was it, almost forty relationships by the age of twenty?"

Oh my god, as if he remembers. I expect Storie to blush, but she laughs and nudges my side.

"I think Liam may have had a tad too much involvement in the answers."

Dad looks at me. He's grinning. "I had my suspicions. Don't worry, Storie, I didn't need a quiz to know what a wonderful young woman you are, and how good you'd be for my son."

He puts his hand on my shoulder and squeezes gently and I'm so touch-starved when it comes to my dad that I almost melt. "Thank you for coming home for the holidays," he says, to both of us. "We won't keep you any longer – drive safe, you two."

"Thank you, Vitaly," Storie says. She talks to my parents with such confidence, uses their names with such ease, I am in constant awe of her. "Thank you for a great few days." She bends down to hug Daria, and when Anna runs over, Storie snuggles her. "I'll miss you two. You'll have to come and see Liam and me in Cleveland."

"We can have a sleepover!" Daria squeals.

"Then you'll have to warn me before you come over, because there's only one bed in my apartment at the moment."

I spy the twitch of Mom's eyebrows at that. I hug her goodbye, and she holds on tight.

"Let's not leave it so long next time," she says, and when I let go, she slips a couple twenties into my hand. "For gas."

"Mom, no, I can p—"

"Take it," she says, folding my hands over the money, and in a low voice she adds, "If you don't need gas, then treat Storie."

I slip it into my pocket. "Thanks, Mom."

She touches my cheek – a bit of a reach; she's fairly vertically challenged – and puts her arm around Daria. "Right, then. You two get going. You won't want to be getting in too late. Text me when you're there, okay?"

"Of course." I check my pockets to make sure I've got my wallet and my phone, and everything else is in the car. "All right, I think that's it."

Anna wraps herself around my knees and says, "Bye-bye, Lee-lee."

I stroke her soft hair. "Bye, Anna banana."

Mom and Dad follow us to the front door to wave us off, and Dad catches my elbow when Storie heads out to get the car started. I hang back a moment, and he plants both of his hands on my shoulders.

"It's good to see you, Liam," Dad says, his touch firm and reassuring. "It's good to see you in such better spirits than the last time you were here." He glances over my shoulder to Storie. "She brings out the best in you, son. I'm proud of you."

My throat catches. "Thanks, Dad." I can't put into adequate words how much it means to hear that from him.

"Don't let her go. I know how you feel about her," he says. I cast a look at Storie, my heart softening at the sight, and Dad lets out a low chuckle. "There it is. I know that look so well. I know the feelings that accompany it." He drops one hand to slip it around Mom's waist, and I drink up every moment of this affectionate version of my stoic father.

"I really love her," I say.

"I knew it four years ago and I know it now." He clears his throat, and for a second I think I hear a bit of emotion in his tone. "Do right by her, Liam. I can't imagine anyone better for you. She's a special girl."

And then he hugs me, and I can't help the way my eyes get wet, the way a lump fills my throat and mangles my voice when I say, "I'm not letting go of her. I know how shit it is to see her walk away."

Dad gives me a half smile when the hug comes to an end, leaving me with a waft of his crisp aftershave, and after another Mom hug, I join Storie in the car. The heating's on full blast, but it's freezing at the moment.

"All good?" she asks, waiting for the windscreen to clear.

"All's great," I say, slipping my hand onto her knee as I lean across the center console to kiss her. "God, I love you, Storie Sovany. I love you so fucking much."

Her hands cup my cheeks and I feel it when she smiles against my lips, and I don't care if Mom and Dad are still watching from the steps, waiting until we drive off.

"I love you too," she murmurs, her words quiet and sincere. We bask in the moment for a protracted minute, until the screen's clear and we're good to go.

By the time we hit the I-75, we've got good music playing and the heat is perfect, and Storie's relaxed behind the wheel, driving one-handed with the other on my thigh, our fingers interlaced. I rub my thumb in circles over the back of her hand, a repetitive motion that I know soothes both of us, and every now and then she lets out a happy sigh or a hum of appreciation.

"Why is this so magical?" I ask as we sail past the exit for Lima, a little more than two hours into the journey. I stare out the window at the pitch black night, the orange glow of intermittent lights along the road and the red haze of the occasional car ahead of us.

"Night driving is a whole other realm of existence," Storie says. Her hand doesn't move when she changes lane to overtake; there are so few cars on the road, nothing behind us for miles. It's only just gone eight, but it seems that everyone's already got to where they want to be for the night.

"Like it's just us and the road."

"Perfection," she murmurs, her thumb stroking my thigh through my jeans. Even such a slight touch drives me crazy, and I can't wait to share a bed with her tonight. I don't care if we do anything; I just love being so close to her, my arms around her body as she falls asleep.

The last four years have really done a number on me.

"Did you do much night driving when you and Gray did your cross-country trip?" I ask. "You did do it, right?"

Her expression morphs, a smile growing and glowing. "We did. Oh, god, it was amazing. We had such an incredible time. There weren't many nights like this, because we went in summer and the sun stayed out so late, but there were a couple times that we got so caught up in the sights that we didn't give ourselves enough time to get to our next destination in time to find a motel

"What'd you do?"

She shrugs and briefly meets my eye. "Drove all night," she says. "It was so incredible. We started off thinking we were going to drive Route 20, but we took a lot of detours. At one point, we were driving through Nebraska and Gray was in charge of the map, and he suddenly decided we had to go to Denver." Talking about her memories, her face lights up. "So we went to Denver. And then we kind of ditched the whole Route 20 idea, and ended up in Salt Lake City."

"Damn. It sounds amazing. Would you do it again?"

"Absolutely. It gave me such a travel bug. Gray and I have done a few other trips since then – a lot shorter, thanks to, you know, work and him being married and all that – but I want to go cross-country again so badly."

"Anywhere in particular?" I ask, ideas already forming. I'm woefully undertravelled, most of my experience limited to Cleveland and New York, and a couple frat trips to Miami and LA.

"The south. I'd love to go back to California and drive east. I can't wait to go to New Orleans someday," she says with a soft yearning in her voice. She catches my eye again, her gaze rarely straying from the road, and there's a flicker of electricity when I squeeze her hand.

"We should take a trip," I say. She turns her hand over. Our palms touch. "We could take a week in the summer, fly to LA or San Diego or something, and rent a car to drive to New Orleans."

The moment the words leave my lips, I know that I won't be able to let go of this idea. I want it so badly within five seconds of thinking of it. I shift in my seat, sitting straighter.

"It's, like, two thousand miles, right? We could stop off in Arizona and Texas, make a proper trip of it." As an afterthought, I add, "We could really test our relationship."

Storie laughs. "I'm not going to lie, Gray and I did have a few fallouts along the way," she says. "Nothing like spending weeks in the same car to test yourselves." She turns the music down when a new song comes on and merges back into the slow lane, and lets out a pensive breath. "I like the sound of that. What you said." Pulling her lips between her teeth, she nods slowly and says, "That would be really cool. Though I don't know about a week."

"We could probably make it shorter, if you don't w—"

"Oh, no, I was thinking we'd need two weeks," she says. "Make the most of it, right?"

*

After getting caught up in traffic behind an accident and coming off the interstate for a drive-through coffee, we get to her parents' house a bit after ten. Our car the only one on the road the entire way from the interstate to her silent road nestled on the edge of Five Oaks. My heart inches up my throat the closer we get, even though I've done this before, less than a week ago; it's hard to shake the fear, the knowledge that my fuck-up was exponentially immense.

But we get inside and Tad and Jen are sharing a sofa, watching a movie, and they greet us with soft smiles and tired hugs, and I'm embraced back into the family fold. My worries melt away when Jen hugs me and wishes me a merry Christmas, and Tad offers me a beer.

"I'm afraid Gray and Navya have all the sticking power of ... whatever's the opposite of a slug," Jen says. I can tell she's tired by the way her accent is slipping back to her native Hungarian, her words softening and flowing together. "They went for a ten-mile walk earlier and I think they pushed it too far; they couldn't stay up."

"Ten miles?" Storie laughs. "I'm glad we didn't come back earlier. I wouldn't have wanted to get roped into that." She drops onto the empty sofa and I follow suit, the old cushions dipping in the middle, pressing us together. I put my arm around her shoulders and she nestles against me.

"To be honest," I say, "I don't know how much longer we'll last. It's a long drive."

"You must be tired, honey," Jen says to Storie, who nods against my shoulder.

"Shattered." She yawns to illustrate it. "It's nice to be home."

"It's nice to have you back, bogárkám. And you too, Liam." Her smile looks genuine. The knots in my chest loosen further. I wonder how long it'll be before I can shed those nerves entirely.

"Thanks, Jen. I'm looking forward to the new year, a la the Sovanonos."

Tad cracks a smile at that. "You're in for a treat. Gray's promised to cook, so..."

Storie grimaces. "Uh oh."

Laughing, Tad says, "We're going to give him the benefit of the doubt."

"But there's food in the freezer, in case of emergency," Jen says.

"Which is an inevitability," Storie says.

I've been on the outside for too long. I can't wait for the day when I can be in on the inside jokes, when I have my own.

After ten minutes of idle chitchat, the TV forgotten, Jen groans as she gets to her feet, peeling herself away from her husband.

"Okay, I think it's time for bed. I wanted to stay up to see you two home and now I know you're safe and sound, I can sleep like a baby."

Once she and Tad head upstairs, Storie and I are alone. It's so quiet out here in the countryside, it's hard to believe there are five other people upstairs. It feels like we have the place to ourselves.

"I can't go straight to bed yet," Storie says, reaching for the remote before settling back against my chest. "Mind if we watch something?"

"Course not. Anything in mind?"

She flips through channels and Netflix and ends up on The Office, and I'm thrown back to that day we got caught in a storm four years ago, and I introduced her to the show. She didn't like it; she said it was boring and that it'd be good for falling asleep to. My lips twitch into a smile. She looks up at me.

"It grew on me, okay?" She stops me from saying anything by kissing me before she hits play, and we sink into comfort.

Her body against mine, the end of her plait curled around my finger as I play with her hair. I've seen this episode several times. It isn't one of the best, but there's nowhere I'd rather be, nothing I'd rather be doing.

*

this ended up a bit longer than expected! every time i worry a chapter's going to run short, it ends up being way too long. i hope you enjoyed it!