Chapter 15: Weekends Won Back
Matt handed in his badge and warehouse key to Bren on Wednesday morning. He didn’t schedule a meeting or dress it up. He just walked into the logistics office before shift change and dropped them on her cluttered desk.
“Effective immediately,” he said, his voice calm, flat.
Bren looked from the badges to him, her expression cycling from confusion to irritation. “Two weeks’ notice is standard, Waterson. Professional courtesy.”
“Courtesy goes both ways,” Matt said. He didn’t elaborate. He didn’t need to. The memory of Hannah, pale and exhausted at her new desk in the supply closet, was a cold stone in his gut. “My final paycheck can be mailed.”
He turned and left, the satisfying click of the office door louder than any parting shot. He didn’t look back at the racks or the loading bays. He walked out into the weak morning sun, the diesel air suddenly smelling like freedom, or at least like a different kind of trap he’d chosen for himself.
He spent the day cleaning the apartment with a focus that bordered on manic. He scrubbed the kitchen sink, organized the junk drawer, even wiped down the baseboards. It was a physical purge of the old routine. When Hannah came home that evening, she found him folding a mountain of laundry, the small living area filled with the clean scent of detergent.
“You look… productive,” she said, dropping her bag. She looked exhausted, her shoulders slumped under her cardigan.
“I quit,” he said, not looking up from matching socks. “Like, today. No notice.”
The silence stretched. He finally glanced up. She was staring at him, her mouth slightly open. Then, a slow, radiant smile broke across her face. It was the first real, unburdened smile he’d seen from her in weeks. “You didn’t.”
“I did. Bren can choke on her inventory reports.” He tossed a sock ball into the basket. “FreightStar wants me to start Monday with orientation. That gives me,” he counted on his fingers, “Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday. Four days. With you.”
The concept was so foreign it seemed to short-circuit her brain. “Four days… in a row?”
“Like a proper weekend. Like normal people.” He stood up, crossed the room, and put his hands on her hips. Her frame felt so small under his palms. “So. What do you need?”
Her eyes welled up, but she blinked it back. “Everything,” she whispered. “I’m so tired, Matt.”
“Then first, you sit.” He guided her to the couch. “Then, you eat. I made chili. Again. But it’s the good kind, with the cornbread.”
Thursday and Friday were stolen time, soft and slow. They slept late, her body curving instinctively into his in the morning light. He made her coffee, just the way she liked it, and brought her a bowl of oatmeal with sliced banana because he’d read something about potassium. They didn’t talk much. He filled the silence with errands—groceries, an oil change—and the small, steadfast presence of himself in the space.
When she came home from her desk-bound prison those afternoons, he was there. Not getting ready to leave, not half-asleep. He was fully present, asking about her day, listening to the petty tyranny of Leo and Bren with a scowl, rubbing her feet while they watched mindless television.
“It’s weird,” she said Friday night, her feet in his lap. “I keep waiting for you to look at the clock.”
“I looked at the clock,” he admitted, working his thumb into her arch. She groaned. “It said 7:48 p.m. And I thought, ‘Good. Still hours before bed.’ That’s all.”
Saturday, they left the apartment. They drove out of the city, windows down, arguing over the radio until they found a station they both hated and sang along anyway. They walked through a dusty antique market, and he bought her a ridiculous porcelain frog with a chipped hat because it made her laugh. She bought him a faded vinyl record of a jazz guitarist he’d never heard of. They ate greasy burgers at a roadside stand, and she didn’t once mention heartburn or prenatal vitamins.
The ordinary magic of it was intoxicating. It wasn’t a grand vacation; it was the luxury of shared, unclaimed hours. They remembered each other. Not as co-survivors of a grind, but as people who liked the same bad music and found the same things funny.
Sunday afternoon, she was dozing on the couch, the fading light painting her face in gold. He watched the steady rise and fall of her breathing, the way her hand rested on the swell of her stomach. A fierce, almost terrifying wave of possession and protectiveness washed over him. It wasn’t about owning her. It was about claiming this life, this fragile, built-from-scratch thing they were making, as his. The one he wanted.
He knew then. The plan he’d vaguely contemplated, the ring he’d bought weeks ago and hidden in the spare tire well of his car, it wasn’t for some future, perfect moment. It was for now. For this woman, weary and beautiful, carrying his child and a universe of worries on her small frame.
“Get up,” he said, his voice gentle but firm. “Put on real shoes. I wanna go somewhere.”
She cracked an eye open. “Why? This is perfect.”
“Because I said so. And I’m the one with the new job and the four-day weekend. Humor me.”
They drove as the sun began to dip, painting the sky in strokes of orange and purple. He drove to the old city overlook, a spot they’d found by accident months ago, before the baby, before the warehouse turmoil. It was just a rocky pull-off on a winding road, but it offered a panoramic view of the city’s skyline winking to life in the dusk.
He helped her out of the car. The air was cool, sharp with the scent of pine and distant rain. She leaned against the guardrail, looking out. “Okay,” she conceded. “This was a good idea.”
He stood beside her, not touching, his heart hammering against his ribs. The city looked different from up here—manageable, a collection of lights, not a maze of problems.
“You remember the first time we came up here?” he asked.
“You’d had that fight with your supervisor about the overtime. You were so mad you were vibrating.”
“And you talked me down. Just stood here and made me list five good things about my day.” He shook his head. “I couldn’t think of a single one until I looked at you.”
She turned to him then, a soft smile on her face. “That’s cheesy.”
“It’s true.” He took a deep breath. The rehearsed lines vanished. All that was left was the raw, simple truth. “Hannah, this last year… it’s been the hardest and best of my life. You are. You’re the best part. This… us… it’s not what I planned. It’s so much better. It’s real.”
He saw her breath catch. Her eyes searched his in the fading light.
He didn’t get down on one knee. The ground was gravelly and wet. Instead, he reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out the small black box. He opened it. The simple silver band held a lone, modest diamond that caught the last of the daylight.
“I don’t have a big speech,” he said, his voice rough. “I just know I want you with me. Through the long hauls and the quiet nights and everything in between. The good, the bad, the lonely, the crazy. I want to build a family with you. Officially. Legally. All of it.” He paused, his throat tight. “Will you marry me?”
She didn’t cry out. She didn’t fling her arms around him. She stared at the ring, then at his face, her own a map of shock and dawning, tremulous joy. A single tear traced a path through the city lights reflected in her eyes.
“You’re proposing now?” she finally whispered, a shaky laugh in her voice. “The day before you start a job that’ll take you to three different states? When I’m hormonal and swollen and we fight about dish soap?”
“Yes,” he said, the word solid as stone. “Exactly now.”
She looked back at the city, then at the ring, then at him. She nodded, a quick, firm movement. “Okay.”
“Okay?”
“Yes, you idiot. Yes.” She held out her left hand, her fingers trembling slightly. “Put it on before I fall over or throw up or something profoundly un-romantic.”
He fumbled the ring out of the box. His hands were steadier than he expected as he slid the cool band onto her finger. It fit. A little snug over her knuckle, but it fit. She looked at it, turning her hand, watching the tiny stone glitter.
Then she grabbed the front of his jacket, pulled him down to her, and kissed him. It was a kiss of pure, unadulterated certainty, a seal on the promise. When they broke apart, she rested her forehead against his chest, her hand with the new ring splayed over his heart.
“We are completely insane,” she murmured into his jacket.
“Probably.” He wrapped his arms around her, holding her close against the growing chill. Below them, the city carried on, oblivious. He wasn’t. Every light felt like a witness. “But we’re doing it together.”
She tipped her head back to look at him, the city lights sparkling in her eyes. “Starting tomorrow, you’ll be gone every other weekend. I’ll be here, getting bigger and crankier.”
“I know.”
“And we’re getting married.”
“We are.”
She let out a long, shuddering breath that was part laugh, part sob, part pure exhaustion. It was the sound of letting go of a ledge and trusting the fall. She leaned into him, her full weight against his chest, and they stood there in the darkening quiet, two small shapes against the vast, twinkling grid of the world, holding on.
She leaned into him, her full weight against his chest, and they stood there in the darkening quiet, two small shapes against the vast, twinkling grid of the world, holding on. The wind picked up, a sharp gust that cut through their jackets. She shivered.
“We should get back,” he murmured, his lips against her hair.
“In a minute.” Her voice was muffled against his shirt. She wasn’t ready to break the seal of the moment, to start the car and begin the journey back toward tomorrow’s inevitable separation. The ring on her finger felt alien and solid, a new weight she kept flexing her hand to feel. Then, without a word, she straightened up and took his hand. Her grip was surprisingly firm. She pulled him away from the guardrail, back toward the car, her steps decisive on the gravel.
“Han? You okay?” The question was instinct, concern.
She didn’t answer. She just opened the back passenger door of his sensible sedan. The dome light clicked on, harsh and yellow, illuminating the worn gray cloth seats and a forgotten coffee cup in the holder. She turned to him, her face stark in the artificial light. Her eyes were wide, almost wild, pupils swallowing the blue. The quiet awe from the proposal was gone, replaced by something hotter, more immediate.
“Get in,” she said. It wasn’t a suggestion.
Understanding flickered in his eyes, followed by a practical hesitation. “Here? It’s cold. And… cramped.”
“I don’t care.” The words tumbled out, stripped bare. “I need you now. Not tomorrow when you’re gone. Not next week. Right here.” She pulled him by the front of his jacket, her small frame exerting a force that surprised them both. He let himself be guided, ducking his head to climb into the back after her. The door shut with a solid thunk, plunging them into near-darkness, the only light now coming from the distant city and the soft green glow of the dashboard.
It was awkward instantly. The space was too short for his legs. His knee jammed against the center console. The seat fabric was cold and scratchy through their jeans. She wrestled with her own layers, a frantic, ungraceful fight against her sweater and the maternity panel of her pants. He started to help, his hands finding hers in the dark, but she batted them away. “Just… be here,” she breathed, her voice thick.
She pulled him down to her, their mouths meeting with a desperate, clacking urgency. This wasn’t like the soft, exploratory intimacy of their weekend. This was a claiming. Her hands were everywhere—in his hair, clutching his shoulders, mapping the solid reality of him as if to memorize it through touch. The console dug into his ribs. A seatbelt buckle pressed painfully into his thigh. He tried to shift, to create a fraction more room, but she held him fast.
“Forget comfortable,” she whispered against his mouth, as if reading his thoughts. Her legs wrapped around his hips, anchoring him. “Just be real. Be with me.”
So he stopped trying to fix it. He surrendered to the clumsiness, to the way her growing belly altered the landscape of their embrace. Every awkward bump, every sharp edge of the car’s interior, just underscored the raw, unfiltered truth of the moment. This was them. This was their reality: a borrowed car on a cold night, a future of separations, a life they were stubbornly welding together piece by piece. The love and romance of the overlook curdled now into a visceral, physical need to affirm that welding, to feel the connection as a shock to the system.
Afterward, they lay tangled in the silence, breathing hard. The windows were completely fogged, sealing them in a private, steamy cocoon. Her cheek was pressed against the cold window glass, his face buried in the space between her neck and shoulder. The discomfort seeped back in—the cramp in his back, the chill starting to bite through their sweat-dampened clothes.
She let out a shaky laugh, a puff of air in the dimness. “That was maybe the least sexy sex in human history.”
He huffed a laugh into her skin. “Disagree.” He shifted, wincing as his knee unlocked. “My back, however, is filing a formal complaint.”
They slowly, gingerly, reassembled themselves, pulling up clothes in the confined dark. The fantasy of the overlook was gone, replaced by the real, tender ache of bodies pushed into a too-small space. He found her hand again, his thumb rubbing over the new ring. She squeezed back.
“Drive us home,” she said, her voice soft now, spent.
The drive back was quiet, the hum of the heater their only soundtrack. She stared out her window, watching the city grow larger, the individual lights merging into a blur. She didn’t feel the ring as separate anymore; it felt like a part of her hand, a compass point already orienting her toward a different north. He kept one hand on the wheel, the other resting on her thigh, a steady, warm pressure.
Back at the apartment, the familiar clutter felt different. The ceramic frog on the shelf, the jazz record leaning against the turntable—they were artifacts from a day before the promise. He made them tea. They took it to the couch, sitting closer than the space required, her feet tucked under his legs.
“I have to be at the FreightStar depot at five a.m.,” he said into the quiet. The words were an intrusion, a splash of cold water.
“I know.” She sipped her tea. “You packed your go-bag?”
“Yeah. It’s by the door.”
“Good.” She set her mug down. The mundane logistics were a relief, a rope ladder back to solid ground after the emotional freefall of the evening. “You’ll call when you stop? Not just text?”
“I’ll call.” He kissed her temple. “Every time.”
They went to bed early. He set his alarm for a brutal 3:45 a.m. She lay awake long after his breathing deepened into sleep, listening to the soft, ragged sound of it. She watched the red digital numbers on the clock, each minute ticking them closer to his departure. Her hand rested on her stomach, and she thought she felt a faint, fluttering pulse deep within, a tiny echo of the frantic heartbeat she’d felt pressed against him in the car.
It wasn’t a butterfly. It was something stronger, an insistent tap against her from the inside. A reminder that time was moving, with or without their permission. She turned carefully onto her side and curled herself around the solid warmth of his back, her front to his spine, her knees fitting into the backs of his. She held on. The ring on her finger caught a sliver of light from the streetlamp outside. Here and now. And now for forever. The thought didn’t feel like a dream. It felt like a contract, signed in the dark of a backseat, sealed in the quiet of their bed, with the dawn already gathering at the edges of the city, ready to take him away.