A/N: Wow, so you guys are pretty unhappy with Eric, eh? I was anticipating a bigger outcry for Sookie to stop being a whiny bitch. Regardless, thank you guys so much for all your lovely reviews; even if I don't respond, I promise you I read every single one. I love hearing your thoughts about everything.
Do continue to let me know your thoughts, please! I love to hear it =]
Chapter 10
April 2012
Our last night in res coincides with Eric's 20th birthday and we spend the entire day together, having packed the previous day. He laughs at the Viking replica I've gotten him in addition to the noise-cancelling headphones he has wanted for ever, and we have dinner at a relatively high-end restaurant where I insist on paying and so does Eric. I pull the if-you-keep-arguing-you'll-be-sleeping-alone card and he pouts but protests no more. I'm bluffing, of course, because he's wearing black dress pants and a crisp white shirt that make my lady bits react in a way that can only be described by trashy romance novels. He lights right up when I make some very naughty promises in his ear as we wait for the valet to pull up the car, and he drives us home with that lead foot of his.
We've been together for a year and half now, and even though we've had our ups and downs, things have been pretty great. Not living across the hall from each other was definitely for the best, since we ended up having to set some boundaries by the second term of our first year together, because it turned out to be extremely easy for us to invade the other's space without meaning to. But we've made it, made it through all the drama that is inevitable when you live in a building with hundreds of very sexually active individuals, a good chunk of whom are interested in your boyfriend. Eric always rolls his eyes when I tell him this, and often proceeds to point out just how many times in a day I get checked out without noticing. It's really sweet of him, and boosts my confidence a good deal, though I would never let him know. It does get him quite a few kisses and more, however.
So yeah, we're doing good. I do worry about graduation, unsure of what will happen once I've graduated and he has one more year to go, but I always figure that things will work out somehow, especially if I stay in UVan for my grad degree like I plan to.
That night, after having just spent a full two hours making love in every single manner possible, I'm just about to fall asleep in his arms until he speaks.
"Let's move in together," Eric murmurs into my hair.
I have to remind myself to keep taking deep, even breaths while I formulate a response. "You want to live with me?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
"Because we're been together for two years and we both have good enough jobs that we can pay rent."
"Ah, so it's practically expected of us," I roll my eyes and turn from him in the bed.
"And," he hooks an arm around my torso and pulls me back into him, "because I love you and I don't see a point in renting out separate rooms in res when we spend pretty much every night together anyways. And because I want to spend our last year together, together."
Wait, what? "Wait, what?"
"I figure since you're graduating…"
"So you decided for both of us that we won't be making it past this coming year." I want to clarify.
"I didn't think you would want to stick around," he mutters, his expression carefully blank.
"Stick around you or stick around Vancouver?"
"Both. You have so much potential, Sook, why would you want to go to UVan for your grad degree when you can go to McGill or something?"
"Maybe because I like it here?" I sit up, frowning at him as I do. "Maybe because you're here?"
"But I shouldn't be a factor. You deserve so much better."
"Shouldn't that be my decision, not yours? Or if you think it's true, shouldn't you suggest it to me and not make the decision for me?"
"Sookie, I just think you shouldn't let me hold you back."
"Again, my choice, not yours!" I unclench my fists and continue, more calmly, "Honey, I appreciate that you think I deserve a better school. I'm flattered, really I am. But I assure you, I would want to stay here even if I had never met you. I love Vancouver, I adore it here, and I love this school, and for some reason that is somewhat slipping my mind at this exact moment, I love you too. And I'd appreciate it even more if you didn't decide for us our expiry date."
"I just don't want you to resent me," he shrugs, avoiding my gaze.
"I resent this attitude you have right now, but I won't ever resent you because this is what I want. This is what I would want if you and I had never made it." Another thought occurs to me and I continue, feeling less sure than before. "I'm not an idiot, okay, I know that we might not make it, and I'm pretty sure I will be the one telling you to leave in two years, but I'm willing to cross that bridge when we come to it. Because I love you." I take his hands into mine and wait for him to gather his thoughts.
"Okay. So all the more reason for us to move in together," he grins and I have to laugh at how easily he flitted from that topic. "Come on, Sookie, I want to fall asleep and wake up next to you, every day," he pouts.
"I don't know, Eric. This is kind of a big deal. I mean, have you really thought about this past the waking-up-next-to-me thing? We'd be always around each other, we'd be splitting living costs and sharing everything. Have you thought about that? Or did you just think we could live together for one year and you wouldn't have to worry about it past that?"
"I do want this for more than one year, I want this permanently. And I know it won't be all sunshine and bubbles, but it's not like we have never fought over the past couple of years. But we've always made it through, right? Because we love each other, and that seems like a pretty great reason to live together, especially if you're staying here for your grad degree. Sookie," he gathers my hands on my stomach and presses his body along my side, "I love you more than anything. I can't imagine wanting this with anybody but you. Can you?" Adjusting my body, I roll onto my side to throw a leg over his hips. His arm drapes itself over my waist.
Truthfully, I can't. I haven't been able to in such a long time, and I don't want to do it with anybody other than him. He's my Eric, he's my best friend and, over the past two years, he's become my everything. I tell him this, in far fewer words, and he beams like I've simply proven his point.
"Okay then," he nods. "Should we look at apartments this summer?"
My face breaks into a hesitant grin when I really think about it, about finding a place to share with just him, a space of our own. "Yeah, okay." His own expression matches mine and he closes the distance between us to kiss me.
"Do you want to…?" His one brow rises suggestively.
"Again?" I giggle.
"Celebratory next-step-of-our-lives sex?"
"Well, when you put it that way…" I giggle again when his lips move to my neck and he rolls atop me. I love the weight of him on my body and tell him so as I let my fingers brush up and down his sides. "Tell me you love me more than anything," I order. It's a game we play, challenging the other to absurd declarations of love, and neither one of us ever backs down from a challenge.
"I love you more than anything," he laughs, grazing a finger along the thigh he has hitched up to meet his hips. "Tell me I'm your everything."
"You're my everything," I grin back. I love the shit out of him. When he rocks his hips against mine, I moan and let my hands roam to rest on his shoulder blades. Not long after, he slides into me and I hitch my legs up further, grabbing his gorgeous ass. His groans mix with the sounds I make as we make love, taking our time for the first time all night. Afterwards I fit my head into the niche of his neck and let my hand tease the hair on his chest, twisting it and smoothing it over his flesh.
"I'm excited to move in together," I admit softly and Eric laughs, kissing my hair.
"Me too."
"Happy twentieth, baby," I murmur into his jaw.
"And it was," my boyfriend laughs and I thump his stomach. His hand swallows mine on his chest and I snuggle closer to him to whisper goodnight and then fall asleep in his arms.
888
Eric and I have to move back home the next morning.
Murmuring quietly to each other as we slowly get dressed, we both use the bathroom and after a quick breakfast, begin carrying our stuff downstairs. My parents bought a car for my 20th birthday last July, claiming that they had some money lying around since I was paying for school myself. It's not a piece of crap either, I was delighted to find out. It's a red 2008 Nissan Rogue and I adore it, infinitely grateful to my parents for giving me a car that will last me quite a while. I fill the car to the brim with my stuff, having lightened my load by making a trip home last weekend with all the things I wouldn't need in my last week of finals. Eric is already done by the time I'm wheeling the last duffle bag downstairs and brings me a cup of coffee from the cafeteria.
"So I'll see you on Monday?" he asks, warding off any potential sadness. We've decided to spend the next few days in our respective hometowns before driving back here to start looking at places. In the meantime, we'll be looking at places online and picking ones that we're interested in, emailing back and forth with details and photos and whatnot. I have to admit, even though I'll be seeing him in four days, I'm still going to miss him like all hell because we haven't been apart this long since Octobergate. Eric's aunt invited me over for Thanksgiving, and he spent the winter break with me at my home, with my parents who have been in love with him since they met him last winter. I'm quite positive my parents love my boyfriend more than they love my brother. I nod, sipping at the double-double he handed me before placing it in the driver's cup holder.
"I think so," I smile, putting my arms around his waist to stroke the depression of his spine.
"I can't wait." Bending down, he presses a lingering kiss on my mouth and we stand there kissing for a few minutes. I cup his face in my hands, stroking over his faint stubble because he didn't bother shaving this morning.
"I love you, I'll see you in a few days," I murmur, pulling him into a hug. Lifting me up, he lets me wrap my legs around his waist and I close my eyes, feeling happy and light.
"Love you," he whispers into my hair and lets me down.
"Drive carefully, okay?" I give him another brief kiss and get into my car. "And call me when you get home."
"Ditto." He leans down and smiles at me through my open window. "Bye."
"Bye."
888
My parents take my news in stride, even managing to be excited for me. I appreciate their open-mindedness with the whole situation, especially on my dad's part because it can't be easy for him, accepting that his little girl wants to be living with her boyfriend. However, I point out, we've been together for almost two years, we love each other, and our relationship is functional and comfortable to the point where we've been dubbed the Old Married Couple by our close friends. I talk to Eric the night after my discussion with my parents to see how it went on his end of things. He tells me that his aunt wept, mostly in happiness, and told him she would be accompanying him to Vancouver to look at apartments. My parents will be accompanying us as well, I tell him, and we hang up even more excited than we had been before.
Back in Vancouver, it takes us a week to decide we want the first place we look at. It's tiny, but the bedroom is about as big as the living room and that's kind of perfect, considering the size of the bed we will have to get to accommodate my boyfriend. It's the second floor of an old townhouse that the owner remodeled to make independent of the first floor, with a fire escape-esque set of stairs leading up to it through the back of the building. The kitchen is decently-sized, to our mutual pleasure, which means that the bathroom is the one room that suffers, size-wise. We're in love though, and just to put the cherry on top of this perfect apartment is the fact that the landlady, old Mrs Bellefleur, only wants a minimal amount of rent due to her deceased husband having left her more than comfortable, financially. Oh, and also, it's practically right on campus.
We move in near the end of July.
Our furniture consists of a series of hand-me-downs from my parents and Eric's aunt; my parents even begrudgingly donate the old king-sized bed they kept in their guest room. The rest of the stuff comes together pretty quickly; an old desk belonging to Eric's aunt's second husband, an armchair in shockingly good conditions from my parents' basement, a small dining table retrieved from the storage unit my parents kept my Gran's furniture in following her death. We have to buy the rest of the stuff, splurging a little bit on the couch but finding chairs and a set of drawers through various garage sales. We fully move in on the last day of July, with the help of my parents, Eric's aunt and her latest husband. Mrs Bellefleur makes us iced tea to help us cool down, and invites us over for dinner which we politely decline, claiming exhaustion. By six, all the parental figures have left and we're in a fully-furnished, fully-stocked apartment all by ourselves. The sheer excitement has to wait while we collapse on the couch for a few hours. It's nine by the time we wake up and we peel ourselves off the couch and off each other, our sweat-dried skin sticking together. Ordering a pizza, we hop into and proceed to christen the shower, emerging flushed and sated just in time for the pizza to arrive. We laze around after dinner, watching a few episodes of How I Met Your Mother on DVD since the cable and internet have yet to be connected.
"Do you want to go to bed?" Eric asks when we're done season two for the fortieth time.
"Mm hmm." I smile and tell him to stay there and not come into the bedroom until I tell him. Regarding me curiously, he nods once and I walk away. In our bedroom, I quickly put on the black lacy sheer slip and matching thong. I'm usually not one for thongs, but I figure Eric will appreciate how it displays my ass. I pull out the various candles I had hidden in a box sneakily labeled clothes. Placing them all over the room, I light them all and, neatly folding down the covers, lay myself down.
"Eric," I call in a singsong voice and he appears a moment later, his jaw dropping when he takes it all in. I accept the hand he holds out to help me off the bed and let him twirl me around to take in the entire outfit.
"What's the occasion?" he asks with awe in his eyes.
"The occasion is me moving in with my amazing boyfriend. I just wanted something to, uh, express how excited I am about our new living arrangements." I beam at him, noting that he has his own way of expressing his excitement. Resting my hands on his biceps, I rise on my tippy-toes to softly kiss him, giggling when his hands drop to squeeze my ass. I pull away to quickly undress him and lead him back to the bed, resting my head on the pillows and I cooing happily when he rests his body atop mine. He nudges my thighs apart to rest his hips on mine, and my hands wander to learn the topography of his muscular back. I moan when his mouth busies itself with my neck.
"You're so beautiful, how are you so beautiful," he murmurs and I feel a spark of happiness shoot down my spine. I love the way he speaks when we're in bed. His tongue laves at my nipple through the thin material and I arch my chest into his mouth, wanting more. I'm so into what he's doing to me that I grumble when he abandons his efforts to tug off my thong and slide down in the bed. He places my feet on his shoulders and strokes his fingers up and down my thigh while his mouth begins doing what it does best. I've been wet practically ever since I left him in the living room, in anticipation, and what he does to me with his perfect lips is enough to make my hips move against his face. Letting my fingers thread through his blonde hair, I have to keep from shoving his face further in, forcing myself to be content with the way his tongue is pushing in and out of me.
"Eric, more, please," I gasp and his warm mouth moves up to my clit, his fingers replacing his tongue. "Oh god, Baby, oh god," I chant out, tightening my hands in his hair. My spine arches, pushing my pelvis forward for him to take with his mouth and my own mouth opens in a silent cry as I convulse around his fingers. My knees fall open as I relax into the mattress, my chest rising and falling rapidly as I recover from the orgasm. Eric kisses the inside of my thigh and crawls up to kiss my mouth, my juices still glistening on his lips, and I barely have the energy to really kiss him back but he doesn't really seem to mind. I can feel him hard against my thigh and the thought of that part of him inside of me instead of his fingers is enough to rouse me from my daze and I capture his mouth.
"Sookie," he whispers gruffly, fingering the flimsy material of my slip. "I want to fuck you in this." I can't help moaning and just like that, a switch is flipped and our pace quickens from lovemaking to fucking. His tongue slips into my mouth and is still there when he, with a jerk of his hips, fills me. I abandon his mouth to gasp in a lungful of air and wrap my legs around his waist, but he pauses to move my feet once again to his shoulders. His hands hold onto my thighs and he establishes a fast rhythm that soon has us both crying out. It's so liberating, that we can actually make some noise in our own place, and I gasp his name, knowing how much he likes it when I call his name when he's inside me. Briefly wondering if Mrs Bellefleur can hear us but dismissing the thought with the hope that her hearing aid is already out for the night, I let myself get lost in the sensation of him moving inside me at a rapid pace and soon my entire body is tensing with my impending orgasm.
"FuckIloveyou," my voice breaks. "Holy shit!" And with that, I'm coming around him, my muscles tightening enough to trigger his orgasm and milking him for all he's worth. Utterly spent, Eric pulls out, falling a little to the side so that his body is half on mine with his head resting over my shoulder.
"You are my most favouritest person in the whole wide world." He smoothes my damp hair away from my forehead and presses a kiss into my lips before tucking his face into my neck. "You're perfect." If my face wasn't already flushed from our exercise, I would be blushing but as it is, I just turn my head to kiss his forehead.
"So I'm guessing you like this?" I indicate the slip.
"This and that tiny piece of fabric you call underwear." He chuckles throatily.
Nudging him away, I slip off the lace and push him onto his back so I can rest my head at the juncture of his shoulder.
"I can't wait until the next time you wear it."
I think of that orgasm I just had and have to agree.
August 2012
Sookie
"Eric!" I screech in the least attractive manner possible. "For the love of God, put the cap on the freaking toothpaste!"
"Yes, sweetheart," he yells back from the living room where he's shutting everything down in preparation for bed.
"It's not funny." I stomp out of the bathroom to glare at him. "It takes like three seconds to screw the cap back on. Why is it so beyond your realm of capabilities?"
"Why is it such a big deal? It's just a cap!"
"Yeah, a cap you can take a moment of your day to put back on, and you still don't."
"Because it's just a cap, Sookie. You realize that, right? It affects very little in the grand scheme of things." His voice is tinged with sarcasm now and does very little to calm me.
"Alright, well, I guess in our tiny scheme of life, you'll be spending the night on the couch," I hiss back.
"Why would I sleep on the couch when you're the one who has a problem with a toothpaste cap?"
"Because I am about to kick your ass, Eric Northman!"
He snorts, actually snorts. "You and what army?"
"Oh, you stupid-" I run at him and pound my fists on his chest in the second it takes him to grab my wrists and pin me to the wall, placing the mother of all kisses on me. Legs wrapping around his waist, I still scowl at him when he breaks the kiss. "You're a jerk."
"Oh baby, I love it when you call me that," he growls. When his eyes flash playfully and he ducks down to kiss my neck, I moan and grind my hips into his hardness, calling him an ass in the process.
"More," he groans in mock arousal even though I can still feel him through his pants.
"I hate you." I have to bite back the laughter because this is just silly but even though we're joking around, this is still really hot and I arch my back to push my breast into his palm. We have hot and dirty wall-sex, and afterwards Eric carefully lowers us both to the floor, lying back so I'm on top of him.
"Okay, but you still need to stop leaving the cap off," I mumble into his neck and he chuckles breathlessly to ruffle my hair and press a kiss into it.
"If you still have mind-blowing wall-sex with me, I'll cap everything in the apartment."
888
Other than the little things that bother me, I quickly decide that I love living with Eric. Three years of living in a room with a shared bathroom had almost been too much, and I had considered moving out until I'd seen Eric's carefully composed face, so I hadn't really pushed it, since it wasn't a big deal to me anyways. Living with said boyfriend in a home of our own is better anyways, especially since we're still practically on campus, except with a private bathroom and a living room of our own. The downside is we actually have to prepare every meal and keep a stocked fridge if we don't want to starve. We do try to adjust our work schedules so we're at home around the same times, wanting to make sure living together feels like living together. He's pretty good about picking up his socks and putting down the toilet seat, which is at least a relief. I know he hates it when I don't turn the TV off when I leave the room, but I figure it balances out with the toothpaste thing and eventually let it slide. We switch off on cooking dinner, though we're pretty flexible with taking an extra day if the other isn't feeling up to it, especially once school starts.
With the school year comes the time for grad school applications; UVan, and a couple of others just in case I don't get in. Except I haven't quite thought through what I'm going to do if I don't get into into UVan; my backup is UVic, a few hours away by ferry, but living together makes things a bit complicated. I can't help feeling like I didn't quite think things through, that this is a mistake and I'm going to pay for it by having to take drastic measures and completely change the path my life is taking. Eric has to talk me down from the figurative edge at one point, when I'm knee-deep in applications and hyper-ventilating.
"Sookie, you have like a 3.9 GPA, you're going to get in."
"3.85," I correct, tears filling my eyes and his eyes widen as he senses my breakdown has very little to do with logic. Pulling me into his lap, he wraps his arms around my waist.
"What are you worried about?" he asks. "This place? Our contract runs out next summer. You can't possibly be worried about us because you have to know we'll make it, no matter what. You know that, right Sookie?"
"But what am I supposed to do, if I get in somewhere else? Am I supposed to take it, or stay here and try again?"
"You do whatever the hell you want to do. If you think you can be satisfied at another school, take it. If UVan is where you want to go, no matter what, then you stay here and try again."
"What about you?" I sniffle, hiccupping a little bit.
"What about me? I love you, I want you to be happy. You're also the only one I want, so we'll do long-distance unless you tell me you don't want to."
"But that's so unfair to you."
"No, it has nothing to do with fairness," he tells me quite calmly. "You're not doing something to hurt me, you're just trying to live your life and I would have to be one selfish motherfucker to resent you for it. Nothing unfair is being done to me; long-distance won't be easy on either one of us, but if you tell me you want us to be together, then we'll do it." Wiping away my tears, he offers me a smile and kisses my cheek. "Besides, it'd only be for a year, and I could apply to grad school where you're going… And I don't even know why we're discussing this in the first place because you will get into UVan."
I sniffle, wincing at the snot I swallow, and nod at him. "Okay."
"Say, 'Eric, you are right'," he orders and, when I scoff, insists, "Say it!"
"Eric, you're right," I grumble.
"Now say it like you believe it."
I sigh. "Eric, you are right."
"Good girl. See? Everything's going to be fine."
Eric
I remember thinking that having a relationship when you're in your last year of high school is stupid. Beyond stupid. Because, assuming you even make it to the end of the year, there's still the question of whether or not you're going to stay together after the summer. If you don't, then it sucks because you'll be plagued with the what-if's, what if you didn't have to move away, what if you'd tried long-distance, what if. And if you stay together, you have to spend weeks at a time virtually single, alone, pining for somebody who isn't there and without the added benefit of random hookups to make you feel better about yourself.
Of course, by the time I would have had to worry about any of those things, my girlfriend whom I had thought I loved had already cheated on me with my friend and then gotten killed because of a car accident that we both got in. So it had been a moot point for me then.
Now, I think this is worse than any end-of-high-school relationship limbo could have been, because I'm not a kid anymore. I'm twenty, and my girlfriend of two years, maybe the love of my life, may have to move away and that sucks more than anything because I can't hold her back, especially if she doesn't want me to. I can't make her settle – if she wants something more – because I love her too much to have her be unhappy, but I love her too much to live without her.
But then I have to hold her in my arms as she sobs and I have to rethink the limbo thing, because here I was worrying about my own internal conflicts, not realizing that she has one of her own because she loves me too and she doesn't know what the hell to do any more than I do.
And I love her so fucking much, it feels like my heart is going to burst out of my chest.
"I'm invoking my rights, in this relationship."
Sookie barks out a short laugh. "I beg your pardon?"
"My rights. I'm invoking them."
"Which rights?"
"My rights to… have you listen to me. For a little bit." She narrows her eyes at me.
"Go on."
"We need to stop worrying about this. Both of us. Because we are, worrying about this, and there's no point to it until we know if you've been accepted you UVan. In the unlikely event that that doesn't happen, then we can worry about all this shit."
"And you're invoking your… relationship rights."
"Right. With capital letters." I shoot her my most charming smile and she regards me with a dubious look.
"I can't help worrying about it."
"But there's no point. It'll all have been useless when everything works out."
"But Eric-"
"Shush! My rights have been invoked, Miss Stackhouse!" I do my best to put on a self-righteous expression and she pouts before nodding that she understands. Still, she looks so subdued that I bend down to kiss her, lightly at first and then with a bit more passion when she kisses me back.
"I love you."
She regards me for a long moment and nods again. "I know you do." Pressing a kiss into my cheek, she brushes the bit of stubble I have let grown out and giggles. "And I'm rather partial to this beard thing you've got going. It makes you look manly."
"I'm always manly." I frown in mock offense.
"I know, but now you're rugged." She giggles again and rubs at my chin. "And really sexy. It's a turn on." There's a sudden heat in her eyes, and she leans forward, ever so slowly. We kiss, gently at first, barely touching, and then she's wrapped tight around me as I carry her to our bed. Undressing ourselves, I settle myself against her hips and bury myself inside her with a deep thrust. She feels like home, has felt like it since the first time we did this almost two years ago. Now is no different, and the warmth I feel in the pit of my stomach when she arches into me has nothing to do with my impending orgasm. I want to prolong this, for as long as I can, and I savour every thrust of my cock inside her.
"Eric," she whispers and tugs me down for a kiss. Her legs are wrapped tight around me, and I groan at the sound she makes when I drop a hand down to tease her clit. Letting my mouth wander down, I capture her breasts and make another sound when she pushes her chest into me.
"I'm close," my girl breathes. "Kiss me." Hands drifting to my ass when I do, Sookie whispers that she loves me into my lips.
"God, Sook." I'm so close, I can fucking taste it in my teeth and I add a little grind to my thrusts, hitting all her spots until she cries out and spasms around me, taking me with her. In the aftermath, I lie facing her and she drapes a leg over my hips. We push each other's damp hair away, and she giggles when I kiss her moist forehead.
"Love you," I murmur. She buries her head in my chest with a quick lick to my nipple and I jerk. "Christ. You're something else."
"I'm yours."
I let my fingers stroke through her hair, matted and messy from our romp in the bed. She watches me drowsily, as I twirl a piece of hair around my finger and then let it unravel. Taking the hand she has resting on my waist, I stroke her ring finger and look up to find her eyes glued to our hands.
"One day, I'll ask you. Okay?" Her gorgeous blue eyes meet mine as I continue, "Not right now. You deserve so much more than I can give you right now. But one day, I'll ask you to be my wife." Entwining her fingers with mine, Sookie stretches forward to press a kiss into my chin.
"And when you do, I'll say 'yes'."
Sookie
I receive my acceptance letter in February, to our mutual relief. Eric waits patiently as I gather myself enough to tell him that yes, he was right, I obviously had nothing to worry about. Afterwards, he makes an entry in his Blackberry calendar, marking my having said the words "you are right" to make sure he has evidence, for any and all future incidents.
Of course, that summer I have to start worrying about Eric's grad school. I sit him down in September and tell him I'll support his choice of grad schools, no matter what he picks. Even if he picks the University of Toronto, I make sure to add, and he laughs and tells me there's no need; he wants to go to UVan. When I try to argue, he interrupts me with a kiss because he has no interest in going anywhere else. I have to make sure, that he's sure, because I don't want him to resent me, and he assures me over and over again that I have nothing to worry about. In January of the following year we receive a letter from the University of Vancouver and I consider throttling him to death when he lays the envelope aside and finishes his breakfast, swallowing the very last drops of coffee before picking it up again. It's an acceptance to the graduate Business program, and I realize I'm more excited than I was about my own acceptance when I squeal and start hopping on the spot. Laughing, Eric scoops me up in his arms and carries me to the bedroom, where we proceed to celebrate for several hours.
A few days later I realize that this is it; there are no other major variables left in our lives. In a few years, we'll both be done school for good and we can stop worrying about holding the other back. No more fears of not receiving acceptances, or of not managing to live together, or of the other not wanting the same things. We've been talking about marriage for a few years; nothing too serious, just hypotheticals and how we would want things if and when it turns out to be in the cards for us. I've loved him for far longer than I thought I would when I walked into his res room nearly four years ago, and he loves me far more than I thought I would get; I'm willing to marry him the moment we're both done this grad school thing we've gotten ourselves into. For now though, I'm totally content with what we have.
As long as we want the same things, waiting until we're ready sounds like a good plan to me.
