Anchor - M. Mabie Page 0,48

had already wandered between my legs. He was a great multitasker. “Okay, bye. Okay! I will. Love you too.”

“Bachelorette party?” My head swam. I was starving. I needed a shower and most importantly, I was desperate for coffee.

“They’re picking you up at seven.” He lay down next to me, but I feared for his health if he got much closer. I was fairly positive my breath could peel paint. I brought the sheet up to my mouth to spare him.

“What time is it now?” I asked through the linen.

“It’s only nine. You have plenty of time to bleach your mouth out and knock off the big chunks in the shower.” Why wasn’t he hungover? I’m sure he drank more than I had.

“How do you feel?” I asked. He appeared fresh as a fucking spring lamb. It was kind of bullshit.

“I’m great. Plus, a package arrived for you.”

I clumsily thumbed through my mind trying to remember what I’d ordered. I came up short. “I don’t think I ordered anything.”

“You didn’t. I did. It’s actually a few packages.”

“You have my attention.”

We were never big on gifts. In fact, we’d never exchanged gifts for holidays or birthdays. I knew his birthday was right before Christmas—only through Micah had I learned that. I was always too afraid to buy him things, because I didn’t want him to buy me things that would make me miss him. That was before. Before I got my shit together. Before the wakeup call. Before my divorce and our engagement. We’d officially made it past the shitty before phase we’d blocked ourselves into.

Suddenly, I didn’t feel that bad. I would survive. At least long enough to open up my presents.

“I have coffee and Pop-Tarts waiting for you in the kitchen.”

Like the perfect example of grace and agility, I kicked my legs free of the tangled sheet and damn near fell off the bed.

“You’re a beautiful mess today,” he teased.

“Why, thank you.”

“It’s a fucking bike!” I shouted as I tore the cardboard off the humongous box. Well, it might be a bike. At the moment it was just bars and wheels and some other stuff in a box. “You bought me a bike?”

“Yeah, I have a lot of special days to make up for. Plus, it’s kind of for me too. I miss riding, but I want you to come with me.”

“Will you help me put it together?” I was smart. I was competent. What I was not, was industrious. In theory, I could put things together. I understood directions, but implementing them and getting them right? Well, I’m a big enough girl to admit I could use some help.

“You bet your sweet ass I will.” He showed me the wrench he already had in his back pocket. Casey with tools. Totally hot. “I’ll slap this together while you shower, and if everything else fits, we’ll go for our maiden voyage.”

Fits? I was lost.

He walked to the closet by the front door and pulled out two big gift bags. If I wasn’t so excited I may have felt bad for not having anything to give him.

“All of this is mine, too?”

“Oh, yeah,” he scoffed. “Any girl of mine has to have her own gear.” He handed me bags from a sporting goods store and sat on the arm of the couch as I began pulling things out.

A helmet, gloves, knee and elbow pads, a sports bra and tiny riding shorts, new sunglasses, sweat bands, a cool water bottle, a fun handle-bar bell thingy, an iPod pouch for my arm, shoes and socks—he’d thought of it all. It was thoughtful and just like him. The only tiny problem was all of it matched. Like really matched.

No doubt, he hadn’t any help from his sisters.

The thing is—yes, women like things to coordinate, but everything was purple and yellow. I was going to look like a bike-riding misfit superhero.

It didn't matter though. He’d bought it so we could do something he loved together. I’d just have to tolerate looking like goober-grape the bicycle safety queen. And wasn’t that a gift … for him? Maybe the idea was a stretch, but it was with some deep breaths and a full cup of coffee that I prepared myself to look like a real dork in the name of love.

I showered while he put my bike together and laughed at myself in the mirror afterward for a good five minutes.

Dressed from head to toe in Casey’s gifts, I found him airing the tires in the garage.

“Ah!