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No knight in shining armour - but a cowboy will do

pairing: Rhett Abbott × reader

warnings: positive depiction of sex work (strip club), small-town gossip/sexism, non-explicit lap dance, no mentions of y/n

summary: Rhett doesn’t need to pay for attention - never has - but one night under neon he looks up and finds beauty in the last place he expects. You’re onstage: calm, controlled, running the room with good rules and better timing. He keeps his eyes where you ask and learns that consent can be chemistry. A week later he’s back, nervous as a teenager, and you make it easy: two songs, steady hands, the clean relief of being seen. Between shifts and small-town nights there are fries, quiet conversations, and a kitchen that forgives. You don’t need a knight in shining armour - but a cowboy who keeps his promises is nice to have.

notes: feel free to leave comments and/or feedback. likes and reblogs are always appreciated! also, feel free to send in requests!

disclaimer: English is not my first language, so please excuse any mistakes 😊

word count: 17.9k

He doesn't really want to go. He says so twice on the drive, once when the road leaves the county line, and again when the neon from a few towns over starts pooling in the ditches like spilled antifreeze. The guys drag him anyway - allegiance to them is counted in years rather than sense. They laugh and thump the back of his seat and tell him it’s good to “get out”.

Rhett Abbott doesn’t need to pay for attention. He’s had enough women for that kind of pride to be a point of principle. But here he is, slipping cash into a place where money keeps the lights warm and the smiles warmer. The neon buzzes. The floor sticks. The air smells like vanilla, stale beer, and the kind of perfume that survives a storm. The group slides into a corner booth - out of the spotlight, close enough to watch everything. Rhett takes the outside seat, one leg stretched into the aisle.

The club’s a paradox - too loud to hear and too dim to see. The DJ says something the crowd answers with money and shouts. A bartender with a comet-tail of glitter arches an eyebrow when his friends order a round and slide a stack of crumpled bills across the lacquered wood. Rhett keeps his hat on because it feels like armor and sets his shoulders against the booth because that’s where they go when he doesn’t trust his knees. He tells himself he won’t look long. He tells himself he’ll take the measure of the place and that’ll be that.

Then you step out.

The stage lights catch where your robe parts and paint everything else in suggestion. It’s midnight-blue satin, trimmed in rhinestones that throw little meteors across the ceiling when you move. A slit flashes a glimpse of the outfit beneath - white bodysuit stitched with constellations of crystal, a narrow belt at your waist, sheer tights with a neat seam, silver heels that catch and scatter the light like spurs gone fancy. Your earrings swing once, bright as tossed coins; a thin choker winks at your throat. Vanilla and clean skin drift ahead of you, the kind of perfume that knows how to survive a storm. His breath stutters. Something in his chest stands up straight.

The room’s noise goes muffled. Rhett now has the hat folded in his lap, thumbs pressed into the crease, and the grip goes tight without him meaning to. Awe, he thinks - distant and a little startled - not a word he uses even for bulls that jump like lightning or dawns that come up copper. It lands anyway, clean and bright, like steel ringing under a hammer. His breath stutters. He takes you in the way a man reads weather: the line of your shoulder, the sure set of your hips, the rhythm you drag the room into without breaking a sweat. The rhinestones ripple when you turn - stars shaken loose into a night you wear like it belongs to you. He notices dumb, human details that make it worse - in a good way: one nick on the heel, a single stone missing near your hip, the precise sweep of liner that makes your eyes look like they can cut and still be kind. He keeps his gaze on your face, like a promise he made himself. One boot plants hard on the sticky floor, one knee easing into the aisle as if his body wants to move closer, but his manners say stay. The track is all bass and no heart until you give it both. He forgets the drink sweating beside his hand. He remembers only the arc of your smile, the slow economy of your hands, the fact that a dozen people are looking, and somehow it feels like you’re teaching him how to breathe.

You’re beautiful the way the weather is - moving, indifferent, inevitable. It isn’t about skin; it’s about geometry and confidence, about the line from your throat to your shoulder, the certain way your weight shifts on the beat. You don’t rush. You never need to. The crowd leans in; you don’t have to meet them halfway. Rhett forgets the glass in his hand until the cold sweats down his fingers. He sets it aside without looking. His friends are hooting in that way that makes him embarrassed for men as a species; he lets their noise flow past him. He’s not staring like the others - at least, he hopes he isn’t. He’s watching. There’s a difference. He’s taken enough falls to know reverence when it breaks over him.

You find him sooner than he expects you to - maybe it’s the way he holds still in a room that otherwise never does, or the way he keeps his eyes north of your collarbone. You clock him like you clock weather too: the hat, the throat, the hands that look like they’ve known work and whiskey and the inside of a pocket when there’s nothing to say. Handsome, not old. Not the kind that tries to buy more than the room is selling. You give him that split-second that costs you nothing and feels like everything to someone paying. A glance held two beats past professional. A corner-smile that has the grace to be private while half the county’s here. When you turn under the lights, you aim one thread of your attention his way and tug. He feels it like a lariat dropped soft over his shoulders. It changes the air for him. He sits up a little. He forgets about leaving early.

You finish the first song with a flourish that’s all punctuation and no apology. Bills float like autumn leaves at the edge of the stage. A man with a birthday sash throws confetti and misses your mark by a yard. You walk the long curve of the stage to collect what the night owes you, and as you pass the side closest to his booth, you let your gaze sweep, then settle - briefly, unmistakably - on him. It’s not a promise. It’s not an invitation. It’s a gracious acknowledgement: I see you, and you are not the worst thing in this room. The set rolls on. You don’t burn hot; you bank and glow, a better kind of heat. When you step down, the room tilts toward you. Girls in glittered robes exchange nods like handoffs in a relay. You loop the floor once because that’s part of the choreography too - drink water, check on the table that’s tipping sloppy, nudge a bouncer with your chin about the guy who’s getting brave. You pass Rhett’s booth in that circuit. Close enough he can catch the warm-cool flicker of your perfume, close enough to read the tiny scuff in the leather of your heel. He keeps his eyes at eye-level like a promise he made to himself. When you reach his table, your fingers land - not on him - but on the edge of his napkin, two taps like a knuckle on a door.

“You good, cowboy?” you ask, and somehow there’s no teasing in it. He wants to say something smooth, but smooth isn’t his language. “Yes, ma’am,” he says, voice turned down low, like talking in church. The ma’am is clean, not age. Respect. Gratitude he doesn’t fully understand. You give him your full attention for one breath, two. His hat’s brim casts his eyes into shade, but the line of his mouth is honest. There’s a scrape on his knuckle that says he works where there are edges. It’s enough to make you default to your safest move: keep it simple, keep it kind. You lean in, just a little, just enough to make it personal. He goes a touch stiff anyway - spine straightening, breath catching, fingers tightening around his glass. “You keep that seat,” you say. “You make the room look better.” It’s a small gift, but you place it real neat between you. Then you’re moving again, not lingering long enough to turn the moment into something it isn’t. You slide a clean coaster under his sweating glass on your way by, the sly courtesy of someone who understands the theater of attention. You drop a wink at the bartender who’s chronically two steps behind, rescue a drink before it ends up in a lap, and melt back toward the dressing-room door like tide through a channel. Rhett watches you go without greed in it. Wonder, yes. The kind that smooths a furrow between his brows and makes him breathe deeper. He hears his friends razz him for being “struck dumb,” and for once he doesn’t mind the accuracy. He tilts the brim back a notch and, for the first time since they crossed the county line, he smiles.

The next set starts with a different girl, different song, same bass. Rhett sits the way men do when they’re trying not to fidget. He’s aware of his hands, of the pull in his shoulder from the last ride, of the way the booth’s vinyl warms under him like a living thing. He doesn’t buy a dance. He isn’t here for that - not tonight, maybe not ever. He’s here because the world broke open in a place he didn’t expect, and because you saw him and didn’t make a joke of it. You return to the floor near the end of the hour, robe tied in front of your waist. You’re off the clock for ten minutes, and everyone knows it. The brave ones try anyway; you ghost past with a smile that says later or never. You angle your path close to his booth again, the way a bird uses the same current twice. “Still good?” you ask, a little amused now. “Better,” he admits, and the word sounds like he tried it on first. He nudges his glass toward the coaster you gifted him. “Thanks for this.” “Can’t have you leaking all over my stage,” you say and the joke isn´t lost on him.

You leave him with that, because that’s enough. Extra attention, not extra story. You don’t make a habit of feeding the hope that eats girls like you for breakfast. But a handsome cowboy who looks at your face before your body and says ma’am like it’s a bow without bending? He gets a little sunlight in the dark. When last call looms and the neon hum fattens into something sleepy, Rhett doesn’t feel cheated or used or lonely. He feels like he came out for a thing he didn’t want and found something he didn’t know he needed: beauty in the last place he’d expect - under neon, on sticky floors, in a room built to sell everything but this.

On the way out, his friends are all elbows and talk. He tucks his hat down and lets the night take his face. He doesn’t look back, not because he’s afraid to, but because he wants to keep the picture he already has - your glance, your two taps on the napkin, the way you made a mercy of attention without making it a debt. Outside, the air is desert-cool and honest. He stands in it a moment longer than the others, then climbs into the truck. The engine turns. The road rises up to meet them. A few towns over, a man who thought he needed nothing but the ride finds himself thinking about a woman who walked past him and left something better than a bruise: the clean, precise relief of being seen.

⟡ ✿ ✧ ✿ ⟡

He comes back on a Tuesday, alone this time in the hope that you are working that night. He parks farther from the door like distance might rinse the wanting off him. The neon has the same tired hum; the air has the same syrupy perfume. He tells himself he’s just killing an evening, that the road happened to bend this way. The lie doesn’t even bother to dress up. At the bar he orders water, then whiskey, then changes his mind and leaves both sweating on a coaster. He keeps glancing at the door like a boy whose ride might not show. The bouncer clocks him as harmless; the bartender clocks him as a tip in progress. Rhett tugs his hat brim and feels ridiculous for doing it indoors, then more ridiculous for taking it off and holding it in his lap like a shield.

When you step into the room, his chest lifts like he’s been underwater. The embarrassment catches up a second later: he came back for you. Not for the noise, not for his friends, not for a night he can’t remember on purpose. For you. You spot him quick - same booth, same careful posture, different quiet. There’s a nervous energy on him now, a newness that sits on broad shoulders and makes him look younger than he is in a way that’s almost tender. Handsome and not old, yes, but tonight he’s also shy, like the floor might tilt if he stands too fast. On your first pass by the bar, you give him that signature two-tap on the napkin. “You good, cowboy?” He swallows. “Workin’ on it.” “Want help?” you ask, light as a feather. He nods once, then finds his voice. “Could I -” He clears his throat. “If you’ve got time… buy a dance?” You run through your standard: “House rules. No touching. Two songs or three?” “Two,” he says, then adds in a rush, “Please.”

The private room is nothing special - lamp, curtain, loveseat that squeaks an opinion. You cue the songs with the DJ, then step in and let the curtain fall. You keep it professional: you tell him where to put his hands (on the seat), where to keep his eyes (wherever he likes, but you hold them), and how to breathe (steady, like the world isn’t burning down). “What’s your name?” you ask, as you smooth the edge of the curtain. “Rhett,” he says, voice low, hat abandoned on the side table like a surrendered flag. The natural next thing is and you? It rises to his tongue and stalls there. He knows what he’d get: the clock-name, the one printed on cards and whispered over bass, pretty and not-quite-true. He doesn’t feel like he deserves the real one yet, and the idea of prying at it feels wrong - like picking at a good knot just to see if it slips. Besides, part of him is afraid a name would puncture the magic, let the air out of the illusion he’s barely learned how to breathe inside. He swallows the question and lets mystery stay where it’s doing no harm. “First time?” you ask, already knowing the answer. He tips his head. “Feels like it.” “You’re fine,” you say, and mean it. “Just sit back.”

When the music starts, you take your time. You don’t sell shock; you sell control. You straddle the space of his lap without collapsing it, move with the beat in smooth, unhurried lines. Your hands stay on your own body; his stay exactly where you set them. You let the closeness do what closeness does - the warmth, the rhythm, the suggestion - without turning it into something else. He’s so nervous it’s almost sweet. The first time you sink your weight a fraction, his breath catches against your shoulder. You can feel it when his body responds - nothing dramatic, just the plain human truth of it, pressure and heat and that sudden, involuntary change. He goes still, mortified. “Sorry,” he whispers, as if an apology could make biology reconsider. “I -” You tip your mouth near his ear so he hears you over the bass. “It’s normal, Rhett.” Your tone is easy, like you’re telling him the weather. “You’re doing fine.” He nods, Adam’s apple working, jaw tight with the effort of not fidgeting. You pace the dance to his nerves, trading spectacle for steadiness. When you roll your hips the barest inch, he bites off a sound and looks like he might actually forget how to breathe. You ease back a hair, let the music carry the moment so he can catch up. “Eyes up,” you remind, not scolding. He lifts them, and the gratitude in that look makes the room feel smaller and kinder.

By the second song he’s found a rhythm of his own - hands anchored where you put them, shoulders dropping, breath syncing with the beat and your slow, deliberate sway. He’s still obviously turned on; that hasn’t changed. What’s changed is the shame. You let your smile tell him there’s nothing to be ashamed of. You keep the rules with the same gentleness you keep the time. “Doing okay?” you ask midway through. “Yeah,” he says, voice rough but steady. Then, quieter, “Better’n okay.” You let the last thirty seconds be mostly eye contact and suggestion, the dance equivalent of a hand laid over a racing heart to coax it calmer. When the song winds down, you slide away with the same professionalism you brought in, leaving an inch of air like a gift. “All done,” you say, soft but businesslike. “You were perfect.” He laughs once, breathy, disbelieving. “Don’t reckon that’s the word.” “It is tonight.” You stand, adjust your robe back on, and look him over for the telltale signs - spun out, spun up, or centered. He looks centered, if a little dazed.

He fumbles his wallet and then stops, catching himself before he turns the moment into a clumsy apology-by-cash. He folds the bills neat, places them where you can take them without a scramble, and meets your eyes. “Thank you.” “Anytime,” you say, which in this context means exactly what it should: if you book me, I’ll be here; if you don’t, we’re still square. At the curtain he hesitates, hat back in his hands. “I, uh-” He clears his throat again, that teenage echo he can’t quite shake. “I was… a little embarrassed. Comin’ back.” You tip your head. “You came back polite, sober, and respectful. That’s all anyone can ask.” He works his jaw, then nods like you just granted him amnesty. “Okay,” he says, almost to himself. “Okay.” You give him a small, private smile - the kind that doesn’t cost you and might carry him a week. “See you around, cowboy.”

Out at the bar, the room swallows him up again. He stands there a long second, getting his legs under him, then sets his hat on his head like it belongs there. He doesn’t bolt, doesn’t brag. He buys a bottle of water and tips heavy. On his way to the door, he glances back once - not to cling, but to mark the place where something careful and good happened. Outside, the night is cool and ordinary. He breathes it in like a man who finally remembers how, and he smiles at the ridiculousness of it all: full-grown, callused, more miles than money - and yet nervous as a teenager because a woman gave him two songs and treated him like he was worth the rules.

⟡ ✿ ✧ ✿ ⟡

He comes back on another weeknight when the parking lot looks washed out and the neon is doing its best. He tells himself it’s just habit now - same booth, same water sweating on the coaster, same way he keeps his hat low and his eyes level. Truth is, he couldn’t wait. He knows it and winces at himself for knowing it. You’re on second set. He spots you before the crowd does, like his eyes have been trained to find you. He watches the way you time the room, how you make it slow down without ever asking. Tonight it’s a black velvet bodysuit with rhinestone fringe that waterfalls off your hips and ribs, long gloves to the elbow, sheer tights with a razor-straight seam, silver heels that throw little sparks when you pivot. A short robe - deep green satin - slides off your shoulders in a shrug of light, and the stage catches you the way a tide catches a moon.

You dance in clean geometry - hips writing slow commas, shoulders ticking to the count, a spine roll that feels like a drawl. You use stillness like a weapon: hold, breathe, make the room lean toward you because you haven’t given it permission to breathe out yet. When you turn, the fringe answers in a bright hush; when you step, you plant like you mean to own the square inch under your heel. You don’t chase the crowd - you make it come to you. He watches the way you time the room, how you slow it down without asking. He doesn’t buy a dance. Not tonight. He just…looks. Tries to be decent about it, lets you work, and takes the gift of being allowed to witness without taking. When your eyes sweep his side of the rail and snag on him for two beats - no more, no less - his breath trips and then evens, like he’s found the rhythm you were always offering. As the track turns sly, you drift to the edge of the stage nearest his side and angle your back to him. Then you sink into a slow crouch - one knee forward, spine long, rhinestone fringe whispering as it settles - tilting your hips just enough that the view is deliberate. You glance over your shoulder, a two-beat dare, then rise like you’ve got gravity on a string. Heat flickers through him: a thought sketches itself in outline - hands at your waist, a laugh against his mouth - and he corrals it back behind good manners. Palms flat to the table. Eyes up, like a promise. The wanting stays contained, bright and clean, something he can carry without breaking.

After your set he realizes he needs air more than he needs courage. He slips outside, shoulders hitting cool night like a reset button. The brick wall’s rough through his shirt when he leans back. He counts his breaths, then the cars that pass on the highway. He tells himself he won’t make this a thing. He tells himself a lot of things. The door clicks. Footsteps. He straightens, half-guilty, and then forgets to be guilty at all. It’s you - same person, different lighting. The stage is gone; the armour too. You’ve got on a soft hoodie, jeans, sneakers that squeak when you step wrong on rain. Less makeup. Your hair is pulled up in a way that says you did it while walking. You look like a real night and not the idea of one. “My shift’s over,” you say, like weathermen say there’s a chance of rain. “I’m hungry.” “Oh,” he says, brilliant. “Yeah?” “Yeah.” You angle your chin toward the street. “You wanna grab a bite?” For a second he’s all thumbs and vowels. “I- I don’t wanna… if that’s- I mean, do you- Are you sure?” Your mouth tilts. “I asked, didn’t I?” He nods too many times. “Right. Yes, ma’a-” He bites it off, flustered. “Yes.”

You tuck your hands into your hoodie pocket and rock back on your heels, easy. “There’s a diner two blocks over. Good fries. Terrible coffee in a charming way.” “Bad coffee’s honest,” he says, relieved to find a sentence that comes out in one try. You start walking. He falls in beside you, trying to match your pace and not stomp it flat. The night is clean compared to inside - cold air, wet pavement, the hum of a soda machine from somewhere you can’t see. He keeps glancing at you and then away, like he’s checking mirrors. “You look different,” he says, and immediately wishes he’d thought about it first. “Good. I mean - you looked good before. Still do. I just -” He surrenders. “I like this.” “This?” you prompt, amused. “Normal,” he says, gesturing vaguely at hoodie, sneakers, the way your eyes look like eyes and not stage lights. “I like… you, like this.” A beat. “If that doesn’t sound wrong.” “It doesn’t,” you say. No edge, no test. Just fact. “Most people prefer the packaging. It’s nice to be the person for a minute.” He laughs, quiet. “Packaging’s a lot to carry.” “Pays the bills,” you shrug. “But sometimes it’s heavy, yeah.”

You wait at a crosswalk even though there’s no traffic. He notices that and files it alongside a dozen other small rules you keep - how you tap the napkin, how you leave a beat before you smile, how you never crowd. The kind of careful he understands. “Just so we’re clear,” you say, eyes on the blinking hand, “public place, quick bite, then home. I don’t do complicated.” He nods, grateful you said it first. “Me neither.” “Good.” The light flips. “We’ll split the check or you can get this one and I’ll get next time.” The words hit him like a warm palm to the sternum: next time. He tries not to make a ceremony of it. “I can - yeah. This one’s on me. If that’s okay.” “That’s okay,” you say, like you’re letting him hold one end of something light. You pass a pawn shop and a closed barber and a mural that’s lost half its colors to weather. He keeps wanting to look at you and keeps doing it in small, respectful slices. Without the stage paint, your expressions read cleaner - surprise, then humor, then a faint caution that doesn’t feel like a wall so much as a gate with working hinges. He thinks about the lap dance last week - the heat, the rush, the absolutely human problem of his body getting ahead of his mind. He thinks about how you handled it like weather: named it, steadied it, let it pass. He’d been embarrassed then. Right now he isn’t. He just feels… settled. “You always this nervous?” you ask, light. “Only when I like something,” he says, then goes pink like a teenager who realized he said it out loud. “Something or someone?” you tease, gentle as a nudge. He swallows. “Haven’t decided how brave I am yet.” “That’s fair,” you smile. “Food helps with bravery.” He looks at you again, more open now. “You, uh… You do this a lot? Eat with customers?” “No,” you say. “I eat after work a lot. Sometimes alone, sometimes with girls from the floor. Sometimes” - you glance at him - “with cowboys who say ma’am and don’t make me remind them of the rules.” He takes that in like he’s been handed a certificate he didn’t know he wanted. “I can keep sayin’ ma’am if it helps.” “It doesn’t hurt.”

The diner shows up like a lighthouse that never learned subtlety - buzzing sign, fogged windows, a bell that threatens to fall off the door with every swing. There’s a man at the counter with a newspaper, two teens in a booth destroying a basket of fries, a server refilling coffee like she owns the patent on it. You stop at the door and look up at him, close enough that he can see the small smudge of mascara under your eye and the clean skin beneath it. He likes this version more, he realizes. Not because it’s plainer, but because it feels like the right size. Like he could match it without borrowing courage he doesn’t have. “You ready?” you ask. He reaches for the handle and gets it open on the first try. “I am.” The bell gives its tired ring as you step into the warm, greasy light, and the night stays outside where it belongs. You greet the waitress like you’ve known her forever, and maybe you have - Rhett can’t tell. Maybe she knew your parents, brought your first milkshake with two straws, watched you stumble through a teenage date in this same booth. The thought warms him and needles him at the same time. He realizes he doesn’t know your history, not really - just the way you dance and how you look after a shift. And somehow that feels right. He doesn’t need the whole map tonight. He likes the not-knowing, the way your hello lands soft, the way the waitress smiles back like she’s been saving that smile for you. He lets the mystery breathe. He’s here for who you are across from him, not the footnotes.

The diner’s heat is the kind that fogs the windows and makes the ketchup move like molasses when you tip it. A bell wheezes you in; the server waves two menus like flags and points at a booth with a view of the pie case. Rhett holds the door, then the menu, then his breath until you’ve slid in and shrugged your hoodie off one shoulder. “Fries?” you ask, like a peace offering. “Patty melt,” he says, then amends, “and fries. If you’re, uh - if you want to steal some.” “I never steal fries,” you say, solemn. “I appropriate.” That gets a laugh out of him - quick, surprised, real. He puts his hat on the seat beside him, careful like it might break. When the server asks about drinks, you both say “coffee” at the same time and grin at the small, silly luck of it. The first minutes are clumsy in the way that good things start: too many half-sentences, a couple of “sorry, you go”, and one accidental toe-tap under the table that makes him go pink and you pretend not to notice. The coffee is exactly as advertised - terrible in a charming way - and you doctor it without apology. He drinks his black because that seems like the kind of person he’s supposed to be, then adds sugar on the second sip and doesn’t meet your eyes until he owns it.

“So,” he says, bracing a forearm on the table. “Do I - do I ask about work? Or is that like asking a magician about the trick?” “If you ask nice,” you smile. You take a fry and blow on it like you grew up respecting fire. “And I get to choose which trick to explain.” “Deal.” You prop your chin in your palm. “It’s not a sad story,” you begin, and watch the way his shoulders ease at that. “I like it. The job. I like the stage and the control and the cash in hand. I like that I write the rules and then enforce them. I like the girls - their hustle, their jokes, the way glitter ends up everywhere like a blessing and a curse.” He nods, listening for real. “And the part you don’t like?” “The hours,” you answer promptly. “Long nights. The two a.m. version of people who should’ve gone home an hour ago. My feet filing a formal complaint with my spine.” You grin. “But I soak them in Epsom salt and remind myself the rent’s early and no one’s telling me what to wear in the morning.” “Independence,” he says, tasting the word like coffee. “I get that.” “You?” you ask.

He rolls the sugar packet between his fingers. “Parents’ place,” he answers. “I work the farm - fences, feed runs, whatever’s broken today. And I ride bulls when the circuit’s close enough to make sense.” Your brows tip up. “That the one where you wait around six hours to be a legend for eight seconds?” He huffs, pleased you said it right. “On a good day.” You tap a fry against the plate like a metronome. “So we both climb on unpredictable animals for money while strangers shout, measure success in seconds and tips, and try not to get kicked in the head.” That gets him - an honest, belly-deep laugh that turns a few heads and makes the waitress grin from the counter. He leans back, palms up. “When you say it like that, we might be union.” “And we both stretch after,” you add, smug. “Epsom salt or ice packs. Occupational overlap.” “Add duct tape and prayer,” he says, and you snort into your milkshake. You’re grinning like you’re proud of the joke and a little proud of him, too, and he feels it land exactly where it should. He doesn’t know how much of this diner knows you - who watched you grow up, who remembers your first bad haircut - but he realizes it doesn’t matter. He knows the version across from him: smart, funny, beautiful in a way that’s more geometry than glitter; good at rules without being mean about them; brave enough to call the job what it is and gentle enough to let him ask. “Do you win much?” “Enough to keep tryin’.” He rolls a shoulder like it still knows the last fall. “Enough to be stubborn.”

For a moment, comfortable silence stretches between the two of you. You break it first. “Show me sometime,” you say, easy. “The ranch. The part where the day is chores and not applause.” “Deal,” he says, as if the word can stake a flag. He cuts the patty melt and pushes you a triangle without comment. You accept it without ceremony. He watches you in this lighting like it’s the first true picture he’s gotten: less paint, more person. You can see it settle in him - the preference he’s not sure he’s allowed to say. He tries anyway. “I like you like this,” he begins, then rushes to add, “Not to say I don’t - on the stage you’re- it’s… I just mean I like… this.” He gestures again - at your hoodie, your unguarded laugh, the way you dunk a fry and leave it there too long. “I told you in the alley,” you say, amused. “Food helps with the brave. And, sometimes it’s nice to be a person.” “I’m not here to save you. I’m… better at showing up,” he blurts, then winces at himself. “I mean - I am sure some men look at you and think… saving. I don’t. You don’t look like you need anything from me.” “That’s the point,” you say, and it lands between you, neat as silverware. “I chose this. I can choose something else later. I just don’t need a redemption arc to make it valid.” He looks relieved enough to grin. “Good. I’m short on arcs.” He’s still worrying the napkin edge when you tip your head, smile slow. You tap the rim of your coffee and lean just enough to make it private. “I don’t need a knight in shining armour, but I’m not saying no to a cowboy.” Color climbs his ears; his hand goes instinctively for a hat that isn’t on his head. He laughs, a little helpless. “I can do cowboy.” You nudge his boot under the table, grinning. “Then just keep showing up, cowboy.”

You trade small biographies over the grease paper: his brother, your favorite song to work to, his worst county fair, the best late-night breakfast order. He offers a ranch hack for sore feet; you offer a dancer’s stretch for his shoulder. You talk money in the frank way of people who’ve counted tips and gate shares: what it means to pay early, to have a little tucked away, to say no to bad offers because you can. He tells you he liked the way you set rules last week and how it made it easier to breathe. You tell him you noticed the way he kept his eyes up and how that made it easier to smile. You both laugh a lot - not the nervous kind this time, but the kind that loosens the screws in a long day. When the server swings by with the check, you slide it to his side with two fingers. “You said this one’s on you,” you remind, light. He nods and takes it like a privilege instead of a burden. “Next time’s yours.” You pretend not to flinch at the phrase, then let yourself un-pretend. “Next time,” you agree, simple as salt. He pays in cash because it feels cleaner. You add the tip, more than the math, because the coffee refills came before you needed them and that’s worth something.

Outside, the bell complains you’re leaving. The air has turned the kind of cool that makes breath visible in little ghosts. The street is a cutout of quiet storefronts and one cat in a window who thinks it runs the block. “Thank you,” he says, and it’s not for the fries. “Thank you,” you say back, and it’s not for the patty melt. You hook your thumbs in your hoodie pocket and look at him the way you did from the stage the first night - steady, choosing. “Walk me to the corner,” you tell him. “Then I’ll call a car. Long nights and all.” “Yes, ma’am,” he is smiling because the word sits easy now. You fall into step. The diner’s neon hum fades behind you, replaced by the small, ordinary sounds of a town putting itself to bed. At the corner, under the tired buzz of a streetlight, you stop and pull your phone from your pocket. He keeps a respectful step back and finds the moon like it’s a thing he can lean on. “Tuesday?” he asks, the question shaped like hope but trimmed down to fit. “Tuesday,” you confirm, thumb hovering over the ride button. “If the truck holds.” He laughs softly. “I’ll make it.” “Me too.” You meet his eyes. “Long nights,” you add, with a crooked grin. “Worth it,” he says, and means the fries and the laughter and the way you don’t need saving and the way he doesn’t, either. Your screen glows with the car’s ETA. You nod toward the diner once more, like sealing a pact with cheap coffee and good conversation, and then the two of you stand there in the honest dark, waiting for a set of headlights to bend around the block.

⟡ ✿ ✧ ✿ ⟡

They roll up loud and laughing, the kind of pack noise that makes the neon hum sound shy. Rhett comes because saying no would’ve meant explaining a thing he doesn’t know how to explain. He sits at the end of the booth like a man trying to be a smaller target, hat brim a little lower than usual, hands behaving. You clock the group on your first sweep: elbows, birthday energy, a pile of small bills like a dare. You clock him second - careful posture, the steadiness that opens a seam in the room. You do not clock the fact that you’ve seen him since. Mercy is a skill.

Onstage, you let the first song run through the crowd like warm weather. When you cross to their side, you give the table a professional smile and then, in passing, you let your gaze land on Rhett and stay there a beat too long. The boys explode - whoops, elbows, the immediate chorus of “ohhh, cowboy” - and he goes pink and tips the hat like he can hide inside it. You move on without breaking stride. You didn’t out him. You just lit him up. After your set, you make a quiet loop of the floor. At their booth, you drop a fresh stack of coasters and, with your now-famous two taps on his napkin, murmur, “You good, cowboy?” He doesn’t quite look at you. “Workin’ on it.” “Attaboy,” one friend crows. “He’s shy. Fix him.” You arch an eyebrow, amused instead of insulted, and the table loves you for it. The friend who’s clearly treasurer for the night slaps a wad of bills on the lacquer and grins at Rhett with the benevolence of a bad idea. “Private dance for the man in the hat,” he announces, nudging the cash like a puck. “On us. Don’t you dare say no.” Rhett winces. “Y’all -” “It’s a joke,” another says. “We’ll make him sweat.”

You catch Rhett’s eye and keep it, the way you do when a skittish colt needs a hand on the withers. “Only if you want,” your voice is plain enough to cut through the noise. He takes a breath you can see. “Okay,” he says. “Two songs.” The private room hasn’t changed: lamp, curtain, loveseat with opinions. What’s different is the way he stands just inside the doorway like a man who won a prize and isn’t sure he deserves it. You close the curtain and set the music - something with bones, not just bass. “New night, new rules,” you tell him, stepping into his space until you can smell the soap under his cologne. “Hands can go here and here.” You take his wrists and place his palms - one at the outside of your waist, over fabric; one high between your shoulder blades. “They stay where I put them unless I move them. Clear?” “Yes,” he says, voice low like he’s back in church. “And you breathe,” you add, because you’ve learned to say it out loud to men who forget. “Deal?” “Deal.”

You settle onto his lap the way you always do - measured, in control - then let the difference happen: his hands, warm through your clothes, tentative at first and then sure as he feels the permission hold. You move slow, the kind of slow that doesn’t dare the room so much as tame it. He’s polite even now, focus flicking to your eyes when you remind him, an automatic correction that makes you smile. Halfway through the first song, you feel him steady. His fingers spread just slightly at your waist, not grabbing, more like memorizing. Heat rises between you in the honest way heat does. When you lean in, his breath catches at your temple. You could make a spectacle; you don’t. You choose intimacy instead. Near the end of the second song, you bring your mouth close enough to his that the air between you turns into a held note. You can see the shape of his restraint, the way his jaw works once like he swallowed a yes. “Not here,” you whisper, and it isn’t a scold; it’s an agreement. The almost-kiss hangs there, warm and deliberate, its own kind of contact. He nods, exhale rough with relief. “Not here,” he echoes.

You draw back, let the last bars of the song do the work of easing you apart. Then, while his friends’ laughter leaks through the curtain and the next track starts up somewhere out in the bright, you reach into the pocket of your robe and pull a small, folded rectangle. Plain, no glitter. You take his hand, turn it palm up, and set the paper there like a pressed flower. “For when it’s not here,” you say. He looks at the note like it might go off, then closes his fingers around it and tucks it quick into the inside pocket of his denim, like a man who knows how to keep a thing safe. “Okay,” he says, a little stunned. “Okay.” You smooth the front of his shirt with both hands, a practical gesture turned ceremonial. “You were good,” you tell him, the kind of praise that means respect and not performance. “Felt like it,” he admits, shy and pleased. When you pull the curtain back, noise slaps at the quiet you made. His friends are already halfway to a victory parade. “There he is!” the treasurer crows. “Cowboy survived!”

You give the table a showman’s curtsy and, with the same generosity you showed inside, throw the ribbing bone they’re hungry for. “He was a perfect gentleman,” you announce, all innocence, which somehow gets them louder. Rhett puts his hat back on and learns the limits of his grin. It refuses to be small. He tips you a thank-you that’s just for you, then endures the back slaps with surprising good humor, one hand staying near that inside pocket like he can feel the paper through the denim. On your way past, you tap his napkin twice, the way you do. “Eat something,” you tell him, as if that’s all you’ve given him tonight. He nods once. Later, when the hoots have thinned and the neon looks tired again, he’ll slip outside and, with the soft care he brings to everything that matters, unfold the paper to find your name and a number written in clean, sure strokes - no hearts, no stage-name, no flourish. Just a line between here and wherever you decide “not here” turns into. For now, the room keeps spinning and the boys keep laughing, and he sits there anchor-still, smiling like a man who just got handed the next chapter.

⟡ ✿ ✧ ✿ ⟡

He texts first, the next afternoon, thumbs big on a small screen, backspacing like he’s trying to rope a sentence and make it behave.

Hey. It’s Rhett. Was wonderin’ if I could take you on a proper date. Not here. Not the diner. Day off. Nice place. I’ll pick you up. Flowers and everything. If you want.

You let him sit in his own nerves for seven minutes that feel like seven miles, then:

I’d like that. Thursday’s my night off. Pick me up at 7? Allergic to lilies. Anything else is fair game. And I own a nice dress. Just so you know.

He stares at that last line for a good long while, grins at the truck door like it’s a friend, and replies:

7 it is. No lilies. I’ll try to be worthy of the dress.

He shows up on time, freshly showered and fighting his hair into a decision, dress shirt tucked into ironed pants. The truck is cleaner than it’s been in months; the boots are polished; the shirt is white and somehow makes him look both taller and younger. He’s got a small bouquet of not-lilies - sunflowers and pale roses and a little wild green like a field snuck into the arrangement.

When you open the door, he forgets how to talk. Third version of you. Not the stage and not the hoodie. The dress is black with a soft shine, cut to skim, not shout; a neckline that says yes, I know and a hem that says keep up. Your hair is down in a way that looks expensive and effortless even if it was one and not the other. Your makeup is evening, not armor. “Wow,” he says. Then, realizing “wow” is not a sentence, tries again. “You look- I mean- it’s unfair, is what it is.” You laugh, delighted. “I’ll take unfair.” He remembers the flowers and thrusts them forward like a man delivering good news. “For you. No lilies.” “They’re perfect,” you say, and you mean the bouquet and also the way he’s blushing like compliments are a bucking chute. You tuck the flowers into a vase by the door, slip a small wrap over your shoulders, and let him offer his arm like this is the version of the night it wants to be. He opens the truck door for you with the solemnity of a ceremony, then circles to his side and steadies his breath. The restaurant is the kind of place with linen and whispers, the kind of place he Google-mapped twice and called once to make sure he wasn’t supposed to wear a tie. He keeps sneaking looks at you at stoplights. “You’re just- I can’t even come up with a new adjective,” he admits. “I used ‘pretty’ five times in my head and it ain’t enough.” “Try ‘devastating’,” you say, playful. “Devastating,” he repeats, pleased. “There we go.”

Inside, you let the room notice you and then let it go. The host smiles differently at people who know how to wear a night; you two wear it well. Rhett pulls your chair; you touch his hand as you sit, a quick thanks that settles him. The menu is a map of places neither of you have been. He scans it like a man reading weather. “What’s a reduction?” he asks. “Sauce that had a long day,” you tell him, and he laughs, grateful. He orders steak because it’s honest; you order fish because it comes with a lemon butter that has you at hello. The server leaves; the candles flicker; your eyes do that soft-spark thing that got him the first night he saw you. “So,” you say, propping your chin in your hand. “Tell me something you don’t say in a loud room.” He thinks, thumb worrying the edge of a napkin. “I’ve got a favorite horse and a favorite cow,” he admits, voice low. “Don’t tell the others.” Your mouth lifts. “Names.” “June,” he says, already smiling. “Mare that pretends she doesn’t like me ’til I’m halfway to the gate, then follows like a shadow. And Button - black-and-white cow with a spot like a thumbprint on her nose. Head-butts the grain scoop if I’m slow.” “That’s extremely cowboy,” you say, delighted. “I’ll keep your secret from the union.”

For a moment, you are quite. “Also, it’s perfect,” you smile. “I like labeling things in my fridge. Also not very rock and roll.” “Bet it’s straight lines,” he says, the admiration more obvious than he intends. “It is,” you confess, amused. “And I don’t have a tragic backstory, by the way. In case you were bracing for a savior role.” “I retired from saving,” he says. “Not very good at it. I prefer… showing up. With flowers, when I can.” “Noted,” you say, pleased. “I like this version of you.” “The one that remembers deodorant and uses a napkin?” He gestures at his lap, where the linen is obeying. “The one that looks at me like I’m a person and a miracle at the same time,” you correct, gentle. “It’s flattering without being greedy.” He goes pink again. “Can’t help it,” he admits. “You walk into a room and my vocabulary falls apart.” “Then say simple things,” you suggest. “Simple is nice.” “Simple is you look beautiful,” he says immediately. “Simple is I’m real glad you said yes. Simple is I might not eat because smiling is taking up all my face.” “Eat,” you say, laughing. “We’ll practice multitasking.”

The food is very good in the way expensive food often is - small miracles that make you feel like you’re in on a secret. You trade bites across the table, your fork knocking his in a little clang that feels like good luck. He tells you about the last fair where a storm rolled in sideways and everyone smelled like rain and adrenaline; you tell him about the choreography that only works with a certain song because your body learned the math of it. When the server refills your water, she glances at the way his eyes hold steady on your face, then leaves two extra dessert spoons like a blessing. You split a crème brûlée, the crack of sugar loud enough to make you grin at each other like kids.

He never quite stops complimenting you, but he gets better at weaving it in. “The way your hair catches the candle,” he says, offhand, like a man pointing out a constellation. “The way you make that dress look like it was built by an engineer.” “The way you listen like you’ve got nowhere better to be.” You volley back, not out of obligation but because he deserves to hear it. “The way you mind your hands.” “The way you don’t pretend to know what you don’t.” “The way you say please to the server like she’s your aunt.” By the time the check comes, the room feels like it’s shrunk to the size of your table. He reaches for the leather folder with a confidence that’s new and tidy; you let him, because this was his offer and it matters to him. Outside, the evening has softened around the edges. He walks you to the truck like the ground might move and he wants to be sure it doesn’t. He helps you in, then pauses with his hand on the door, looking up at you like he’s trying to memorize a night from bottom to top. “I had a real good time,” he tells you, simple as you asked. “Me too,” you say. “No notes.”

The drive back is easy. He turns the radio low. You talk about nothing on purpose: a billboard with a typo, a stray dog with a sweater, the moon being nosy. At your place, he kills the engine and then remembers he’s supposed to do something besides stare. He comes around, opens your door, offers his hand as you step down. You take it, not for balance but for the pleasure of it. On the sidewalk, you both stand there, politeness and wanting threading a neat border. “Thank you for tonight,” you say, and it means for the flowers and the chair and the way he didn’t rush the evening to prove it was one. “Thank you for saying yes,” he means for the third version and the way you let him see it. You both know what a kiss would feel like here; you both decide to keep it for later, an expensive thing you’re saving for the exact right hour. Instead, he squeezes your hand once, careful and sure. You squeeze back. “Text me when you’re home,” you say. “Yes, ma’am,” he answers, soft. He waits until your light goes on, then looks at the passenger seat where your wrap sat folded and thinks about the three versions of you - stage, hoodie, dress - and how each one is true and how lucky he is to be invited to learn the rest.

On the drive, he sends a single message at a red light, punctuation considered like it might tip the balance too far:

Home in ten. Tonight was perfect.If you want, I’d like to do it again.

When the swoop of your reply lands - simple and sweet, me too - he grins into the dark like a man with a good secret, and lets the road carry him the rest of the way.

⟡ ✿ ✧ ✿ ⟡

It is another Tuesday and he keeps to his usual corner - hat low, hands behaving. You clock him on your sweep and, when you pass the rail, you let a smile ghost over your mouth and lean in just enough for only him to hear. “Meet me after,” you murmur, breath warm against the brim. Two taps on his napkin. Then you’re gone, back into the current. He watches you work the room like weather - steady, self-possessed, kind when it’s earned. He’s getting good at the part where he lets the job be the job. When a floor host touches your elbow and points you toward a private room, he feels the instinctive flinch and names it for what it is - instinct, not instruction. He drains his water, texts his buddies some excuse why he doesn’t show up to the bar tonight, and steps outside for a pocket of air while the curtain falls behind you. The night smells like rainfall that changed its mind. He stands under the eave, counts his breaths, and thinks about fence posts: you set them straight, they hold. When you emerge later - robe knotted, hair fluffed back into order - he doesn’t ask anything with his eyes. He lifts two fingers in a hello. You answer with a tiny nod that says: Ten minutes.

The back lot is a choked gravel square behind the club, all dumpsters and the long hum of a tired highway. Ten minutes become twelve. Then you appear with your tote and a hoodie tugged over whatever the evening required. You point at his truck with your chin. “Drive?” you ask. “Yes, ma’am.” It’s muscle memory, the way he takes the county road that loses its lines and the town’s last streetlight in a quarter mile. You roll the window down an inch and let the cool air rinse the glitter off your skin. A field opens to the left - black ocean, crickets for white noise - and he noses the truck onto the shoulder. “Trunk bar,” he says, deadpan, fishing two cold bottles from a small cooler behind the seat. “Top-shelf: domestic.” You laugh, twist the caps, hand him one. “To long nights,” you offer. He clinks. “To surviving them.”

You climb into the back seat rather than the bed - warmer, quieter, the kind of private that isn’t hiding. He shrugs out of his jacket and drapes it over your knees without commentary. In the dim cab light, you look like the in-between version he’s starting to love best - cheeks bare of stage paint, eyes still sharp from work, mouth soft. “Okay,” you start, settling sideways, one knee tucked under you. “Rules and realities.” He takes a breath. “I don’t mind the work,” he says, careful and plain. “I knew it the first night. I knew it when I asked you out. It doesn’t make me jealous. And even if it did - that’d be mine to manage. I don’t have the right to criticize how you make your living. I won’t.” Your shoulders ease. “Thank you.” “I won’t ask details,” he adds. “If I’m there and it starts to feel…loud in my head, I’ll step outside, take a lap, text you ‘smoke break.’ That’s me saying I’m okay, just getting air.”

“Good phrase,” you praise. “Okay. My side: I don’t talk details, either. Not because I’m hiding, but because I keep the job in its box. If you’re in the room, I still work. If you’d rather I don’t take privates while you’re there, say so and I’ll try to steer clear. But if it happens, it’s work, and when that curtain opens, it’s over.” He nods. “I can handle that.” You tap the bottle against your knee. “I won’t date on shift. After work, public places, and no asking me to bend house rules. No showing up drunk with your friends and making me your party trick.” He huffs a quick laugh. “Fair. I won’t bring the boys. If I come, I come alone, quiet, and I tip like someone raised me right.” “You already do,” you say, and then, gentler, “And I won’t take your money.” He blinks. “For the floor, sure. For… more than that? No.” “For dances,” you clarify. “Now that there is an us. If you need the distance of the ritual someday, we can talk. But I’d rather keep money out of our…thing. You want to support me? Feed me fries.” “I can do fries,” he is smiling, memories of food after a shift edged across his face.

“Next one,” you add, “if I text ‘long night,’ that’s code for: I need sleep, not questions. You text ‘home’ when you get there. I text ‘home’ when I get there.” He nods again, taking it in like fence posts sunk to the frost line. “Deal.” You drink, let the quiet sit. Crickets, far-off semi, the soft tick of the cooling engine. After a minute, you glance over, a little sideways-smile. “And since we’re doing honesty: I like what I do. The stage, the control, the cash in hand, the girls I work with - the hustle, the jokes. It suits me right now.” “Good,” he says, just as plain. “I like that you like it.” “I’m also tired,” you finish, a small shrug. “The hours pull at me. I don’t want to be a vampire forever.” He waits, open for whatever you’re willing to put in the space. “I didn’t make a big thing of it,” you go on, “but I did a two-year program at the community college - bookkeeping and payroll. I like straight lines, numbers that balance, lists that end. It’s…quiet control. I’ve been doing books part-time for a friend’s salon. Thinking about looking for more of that in the mornings. Feed store, co-op, maybe the diner. Nothing fancy. Just work that lets me sleep at midnight sometimes.” His smile warms from the inside. “That sounds like you,” he smiles. “The you in the hoodie. The you with labels on the fridge.” You nudge his boot with your toe. “Don’t mock my labels.” “I’d never,” he says, mock solemn. Then, softer: “If you want introductions, I can ask around. Co-op runs lean but honest. My aunt does inventory at the hardware store; I can put your name in her ear. Only if you want. I won’t push.” “I might take you up on that,” you tell him “When I say I’m ready.” “Yes, ma’am.”

You rest your head back against the seat and look at him - really look, as if the truck light is new sun. “Thank you for letting the job be the job,” you say. “For not trying to rescue me from something I chose.” He tips the bottle toward you. “Thank you for telling me the plan before I grew one for you.” You clink again, easy. The rules sit between you not like a wall but like a map you both can read. A train moans somewhere far enough away to be romantic. He shifts, offers his shoulder without making a speech of it. You slide closer until your temple finds the place it belongs, and his jacket slides higher over your knees. No kiss - just breath syncing, the small choreography of two people who intend to keep showing up. After a while, you ask, “Saturday market? Sunflowers and pretzels?” He grins into the dark. “I’ll bring cash and a tote bag like a man with intentions.” “And Tuesday,” you add, a little wry, “I’ll still be at work.” “And I’ll still be polite,” he states. “And I’ll still text ‘smoke break’ if I need air.” “And I’ll still text ‘home’ when I get there.” “Me too.” You fall quiet again, the good kind. The beer bottles sweat into the cup holders. The field breathes. Somewhere beyond the windshield, the road waits to carry you back whenever you’re ready. Not yet. An hour later he eases to the curb outside your place, no ceremony. The engine ticks, the porch light hums. He pulls you into a quiet hug; you press a quick, warm kiss to his cheek. It’s nothing - polite, small. It’s everything - an outline of a later. A promise said under its breath: not here, not yet, but soon.

⟡ ✿ ✧ ✿ ⟡

The porch light is an old interrogator - too bright, too honest. Rhett eases the door shut anyway, boots set quiet on the mat, hat in his hand like an apology. The kitchen smells like coffee that has given up and hay that never will. Perry sits at the table with a ledger open and a beer sweating a ring onto a feed bill. He doesn’t look up right away. He doesn’t have to. “You’ve been out a lot,” Perry says, casual as a weather report. “What’s going on? New woman?” Rhett sets the hat on the counter, takes the beer Perry slid over without asking. “Maybe.” “That a yes?” “Workin’ on it.” Perry finally looks at him, mouth tipped into that familiar, half-wary grin. “You look like you found the good kind of trouble.” Rhett snorts, takes a drink, lets the bottle buy him a second. “Met her a few towns over.” “Bar?” “Club.” He lets the word sit there, plain. “She dances.” Perry’s brows go up a notch - not judgment, just recalibration. “Okay.” “That’s it?” Rhett asks, a little defensive without meaning to be. “What were you expectin’, a hymn? A judgment?” Perry closes the ledger and pushes it aside. “You like her?” “Yeah,” Rhett says, and the word sounds like it has roots. “I do.” “She like you back?” “She keeps meetin’ me where I am,” he states, thinking of diner coffee and your hoodie and the way you said meet me after like a secret that knew how to behave. “We set rules. We talk like adults. It’s…easy.”

Perry nods like that was the makes-sense part. “And the job?” “It’s her work,” Rhett says, shoulders tightening, then loosening on purpose. “I knew it from the start. I’m not trying to fix it. I’m not… jealous. If it gets loud in my head, I step outside. We got a code for it.” He huffs. “I ain’t a teenager.” “Not for a minute now,” Perry agrees, dry. He leans back, chair creaking. “You worried what Ma and Dad’ll say.” “Little bit.” Rhett rolls the bottle between his palms. “Dad’ll grumble. Ma’ll… I don’t know. Pray creative.” He stares at the condensation on the table. “Part of me doesn’t care. Part of me still does, and I hate that I do.” “Caring what they think ain’t the same as lettin’ it drive the truck,” Perry offers. “You can care and still keep your hands on the wheel.” He tips his chin. “You treated her right?” “Yeah.” “She treat you right?” “Yeah.” “Then we’re halfway to done.” Perry’s voice stays kind, a thing he only let out in kitchens after midnight. “Small town’s gonna talk no matter who you bring home. Might as well be someone who makes you less stupid than usual.” Rhett laughs, head dropping. “She does that.” “Good.” Perry reaches for the ledger, then doesn’t. “Look, Dad’s gonna be Dad. He thinks the sun comes up because he’s got fences to walk. But he ain’t blind, and he ain’t cruel. Ma’s got more room in her heart than she lets on. You don’t owe ‘em a confession. You owe ‘em the truth when it matters.” “When it matters,” Rhett repeats. Perry studies him. “You scared of bein’ the punchline?” “Little.” Rhett shrugs. “Boys see me there, they hoot. Think it’s a joke to buy me a dance. It was funny ‘til it wasn’t. Then it was… somethin’ else.” He feels the small, private weight of your number in his wallet even now. “She’s not a joke.” “I figured,” Perry says. “You don’t bring jokes into the kitchen.”

Silence stretches a comfortable inch. The fridge hums. Somewhere in the house, the old clock argues with itself. “She likes the job,” Rhett begins after a while. “Says it fits. The hours don’t, though. She’s thinkin’ about mornin’ work. Bookkeepin’. She did a program. Numbers and straight lines. Sounds like… peace, I guess.” Perry’s mouth curves. “That does sound like peace. You offer to ask around?” “I said I would. When she asks me to.” “Good.” Perry taps the ledger. “Co-op always needs somebody who can count better than Frank. I’ll put a word in a pocket, keep it there ‘til you say.” “Thanks.” “Don’t thank me.” Perry’s eyes go softer than his voice. “You’ve been walking around here like your boots got a secret. You’re lighter, even when you’re tired. That’s rare. Don’t throw it away ‘cause you’re tryin’ to make it make sense to other people.”

Rhett looks at his brother, that old seesaw of irritation and gratitude settling on the right side. “You ever gonna say something unhelpful?” “Probably by sunup,” Perry jokes. “For now I’m on a streak.” They drink a while in the quiet they’d been raised on. Rhett sets his empty down and traces the water ring with a thumb. “If I bring her by,” he says, casual as he can manage, “you gonna help run interference?” Perry’s grin comes quick and mean in the loving way. “I’ll keep Dad on fence talk and Ma on pie. You do the rest.” “She’s… three versions,” Rhett tells him, surprising himself with the confession. “Stage. Hoodie. Dress. All of ‘em true. I like ‘em all. I might like the hoodie most.” “Most men do, once they learn better,” Perry says. He pushes his chair back, stretches his back until it pops. “You look like you could sleep.” “I could.” “Text her ‘home’?” Perry asks, too knowing. Rhett’s ears go pink. “Yeah.” “Good.” Perry gathers the ledger, wipes the table, makes the kitchen look like a kitchen again. At the doorway, he pauses. “Hey.” Rhett looks up. “I’m glad it’s easy,” Perry says. “Life’s hard all by itself. Let something be easy.” Rhett feels that land where it is supposed to. “Yeah.” Perry nods once, a benediction disguised as a habit. “Night, little brother.” “Night.” The house settles as Perry’s footsteps go down the hall. Rhett pulls out his phone and types home, hits send, and stares at the delivered dot like it is a star he hasn’t noticed before. Then he puts the hat on the hook, turns off the porch light, and lets the dark be kind for once.

⟡ ✿ ✧ ✿ ⟡

Saturday shows up with a blue sky and a breeze that smells like peaches and kettle corn. He gets there early, tote bag folded into his back pocket like an intention, and watches the farmer’s market set itself up the way a barn wakes - slow, practiced, cheerful. You arrive with your hair a little messy and sunglasses you push up when you spot him. No stage, no heels. A cotton dress that swishes when you walk and sneakers that have seen some things. He’s a little gone before you even say hi. “You brought a tote,” you say, pleased. “I said I had intentions.” He offers his arm like a gentleman at a county fair. “Sunflowers and pretzels?” “Sunflowers and pretzels,” you confirm, and it becomes a plan.

You move like you’ve done this together for years - checking tomatoes for a little give, tasting a slice of peach off a knife, debating the merits of honey vs. maple syrup for ten unnecessary minutes because talking about small things feels like a luxury. He pays for the sunflowers; you slip cash to the pretzel guy like you’ve been trained in sleight-of-hand. He ties the bag handles into a tidy square knot without thinking. You notice. At the hot-sauce table you fish a few bills from your hoodie pocket; a fleck of glitter winks on the top note. Rhett squints, amused. “Is that… glitter?” “Occupational hazard,” you murmur. He opens his mouth to ask where from and you tip closer, conspiratorial: “This exact bill was stuffed in my bra last night.” He folds in half laughing, a helpless, wheezy sound that makes the vendor grin and throw in a sample. You wait for him to stop laughing and then smile at him. “Dinner at mine?” you ask, casual as the breeze. “I’m not an outside-clothes person. I want to change into easy.” “Yes, ma’am,” he says, so soft you almost miss it. He keeps finding excuses to look at you and keeps being surprised that the excuses exist: the way your ring finger taps while you count change; the way you tilt your head when you listen to the old beekeeper explain last spring’s blossoms; the way you break a pretzel, hand him the bigger half, and pretend you didn’t. After a few hours, you thread your fingers through his and tug him toward the truck. The drive hums easy; the quiet fits.

⟡ ✿ ✧ ✿ ⟡

Your place is a story he didn’t expect. Not fancy - soft. Paintings of lemons and tidepools. A ridiculous number of throw pillows. A bookshelf where romance paperbacks sit next to a worn copy of a bookkeeping manual with sticky notes like flags. There’s a candle that smells like clean laundry and the ocean pretending to be close. On the fridge, labels. On everything. He takes off his boots at the door without being asked and lines them up straight. “You can laugh,” you say, following his gaze to the fridge. “It makes my brain quiet.” “I would never mock your labels,” he says, sincerity and fondness wrapped together. He wants to live in this room. He wants to carry it around like a lucky coin. “I’m going to switch to easy clothes,” you tell him. “You okay to chop?” “I’m elite at chop,” he answers, and you grin like you’ll be grading.

You disappear down the hallway and he lets himself look around like a respectful thief. A plant hangs in a macramé sling and somehow thrives. A small bowl by the door holds keys and a tiny seashell. There’s a framed photo of women backstage - lipstick smiles, glitter caught like stars - everyone laughing. It makes him want to be gentle with the whole world. When you come back, his heart does a reckless thing he doesn’t try to stop. “Easy” is a soft knit set and socks that don’t match. Your hair’s down, and your makeup is exactly none. You look like the person he keeps falling for in smaller and smaller increments. “Okay?” you ask, suddenly self-conscious. “Perfect,” he tries, and it’s the easiest word he’s ever chosen. He clears his throat. “What are we… uh… what am I chopping?” “Garlic, onion, zucchini.” You set a cutting board in front of him, slide a knife his way, and turn on music with bones - something old, warm, and a little scratchy. “We’ll make pasta with tomatoes and basil. Lemon butter if we behave.” He moves the way hands learn - steady, efficient, careful. You rinse cherry tomatoes in a colander and steal pretzel bits between steps. You cook like you dance: with control and permission. He keeps waiting for the moment to make itself complicated. It doesn’t.

“Tell me one small thing your brother does that would surprise people,” you say, passing him the basil. “Perry quilts in the winter,” he gives his answer, straight-faced. “Grandma taught him. Keeps a box of scraps under his bed, names the patterns - Log Cabin, Flying Geese - like they’re horses. Pretends it’s practical, but it’s how he stays sane when the weather pens him in.” You light up. “That’s perfect. Bet his seams are straight enough to measure with a ruler.” “He’d deny it and then fix your hem in under a minute,” Rhett says, fond. “And you?” He tips his head. “One small thing.” “I name my plants like I’m giving them job titles,” you tell him, pointing. “Accounts Receivable. Payroll. Vacation Day.” He laughs so hard he leans on the counter. “You kill me.” “Not before dinner,” you say, but you’re laughing, too.

Garlic hits the pan and the kitchen smells like the kind of home he didn’t realize he wanted. You shoulder-bump him to reach the salt; he catches your elbow out of habit and then lets go because permission matters. The timer for the pasta clicks down in the background, the sun slants in through blinds, and a dust mote drifts like a lazy planet through the light. He sets the knife down. You look up at the exact same moment. The air tilts. “Can I-” he starts, and doesn’t finish because you’re already stepping closer. “Yes,” you say, a soft yes that feels like you pulled it from a warm pocket. The kiss is the opposite of the club - the opposite of noise. It’s the press of mouths that intend to keep being kind in the morning. He breathes out like he’s been holding something for years. Your fingers slip into his hair, his palm anchors at your waist over the soft knit, and the whole room narrows to the exact square of space you’re making together.

The pan pops.

You both jump apart, laugh, and then sprint in the same direction. He shakes the skillet off the heat while you fan the smoke alarm with a dish towel. The pasta timer starts yelling because it refuses to be ignored. You rescue the noodles; he rescues the garlic; the smoke alarm gives one last chirp of judgment and calms down. When the chaos settles, you lean against the counter, cheeks pink from laughing, and he looks like he’d sign a contract for a hundred more nights just like this. “Domestic disaster level: mild,” you declare. “Dinner salvage level: high.” He tastes the sauce with a wooden spoon, considers it like a judge at a fair, and nods. “It’s good.” “You sure you’re not just butter-drunk?” you ask. “Little bit,” he admits. “Also-” He gestures to the room. “-this.” “This?” you prompt. “This,” he says, and it means: you in socks; your kitchen that forgives; the way his jacket is still on your chair like a claim you both understand without words, the kiss and his hands on your waist. You plate the pasta into bowls that don’t match on purpose. He grates too much cheese; you don’t stop him. At the small table, you sit on the same side without talking about it, knees knocking like a secret handshake. He keeps catching himself smiling into his fork. “This is easy,” you state, half-wonder, half-decision. “Let’s keep it that way,” he answers, like a vow he can actually keep.

After dinner, you label a jar for leftovers - Pasta, today - and he laughs so hard he has to lean on the counter again. You set the jar in the fridge and stand there with the door open, doing nothing on purpose, letting the cold curl around your ankles. He steps up behind you, not crowding, just present, and you close the door on two people who, somehow, are already making space for each other. “Walk me to the couch,” you say, teasing. “Yes, ma’am,” he is playing along. You bring the sunflowers to the coffee table because they belong with the evening. He brings the pretzel bag because dessert is a state of mind. The music spins another old song, the kind that understands a day can be simple and still mean everything. He thinks - without panic, without apology - I could do this forever. You glance over like you heard it anyway, then curl your feet under you and hand him the remote like it’s trust in plastic form. The food nearly burned, the kiss didn’t, the labels are straight, and somewhere, at the back of his mind, a fence post sets just right in firm ground.

You kiss again on the couch during a movie that is not much more than background noise - unhurried, the kind that feels like you’ve already agreed to be kind to one another tomorrow. When you pull back, you’re both smiling like you can’t help it. “Stay?” you ask. “Just sleep.” “Yes, ma’am,” full of relief and something softer in it. He borrows a T-shirt you toss him and tries not to look too proud about the way it smells like your laundry soap. You brush your teeth side by side, bumping elbows on purpose. In bed, he lies on his back until you roll into the crook of his shoulder; then his arm goes around you like it’s always known where to be. No rush. No noise. He texts home out of habit, then grins when your phone glows and you whisper, “You are.”

Morning shows up kind and late. You sleep in. When you finally drift to the kitchen, you make coffee the way you like and he scrambles eggs the way his brother does when he’s trying to fix a day before it starts. There’s leftover pasta; there’s a half peach from the market; there’s laughter about the smoke alarm and a second kiss that tastes like coffee. The day isn’t a plan - it just happens the way good days do. You read him bits from the truly terrible blurbs on your romance shelf. He insists on watering Accounts Receivable and Vacation Day (“They look thirsty,” he says, solemn), and you pretend to fill out a write-up for his file when he folds the throw blanket into a perfect rectangle. You teach him your favorite stretch for his shoulder; he teaches you how to tie the square knot he puts on feed bags and, now, tote handles. At some point you both nap and don’t apologize.

Late afternoon tilts toward evening. You glance at the clock and make a face. “Long night,” you say, apologetic. “I gotta go get ready.” He nods, already reaching for his hat. “I’ll clear out.” “Or -” you offer, and you’re casual, like this isn’t a big, bright thing - “pack up whenever you want and lock behind you? Here.” You take the key from the little bowl by the door, slide it off the ring with the seashell, and drop it into his palm. “Spare. Put it back on the hook when you go?” He sits down like gravity remembered him. For a beat he just looks at the key in his hand, then up at you. Whatever he was going to say gets replaced by a quiet, “Okay.”

You kiss him once at the door - soft, quick, a promise with manners - and disappear down the hall with your “easy clothes” already in a heap and your work bag in your hand. He stands there for a full minute, letting the trust settle. Then he tucks the key onto the counter so he won’t pocket it by accident and rolls his sleeves. He cleans like he grew up being raised by kitchen tables: dishes washed, counters wiped, stove de-buttered, the sink shined until it shows him the good kind of tired. He finds your tiny compost bin and empties it, takes out the trash, and leaves a fresh liner like he’s trying to speak your language in chores. He folds a stray sweatshirt, straightens the stack of mail, and sets the sunflowers where the light loves them most. He drives out for another little bouquet - daisies this time, stubbornly cheerful - and a neat card from the drugstore with no picture, just heavy paper that feels like it means what it says. Back at your place, he writes slow, tongue caught at the corner like a schoolkid making sure the lines don’t lean.

Hey.

Rodeo’s next Saturday. I’d like you there if you want to be. My folks will be around, and I want to talk about that - what would feel good for you, what wouldn’t. No pressure, truly. We can do afterward-only, we can bail at first sign of nonsense, we can skip it entirely and share a basket of fries.

Let me know what works.

P.S. Kitchen’s clean (I hope I did it right). I put the key back on the hook. Text me “home” when you’re off.

- R.

He props the note against the vase, right where your eye will land when you set your bag down. He hangs the spare on the little hook by the door, checks the lock twice, and leaves with that good ache in his chest - the one that means mine without meaning owed. Hours later, you come in on quiet feet, the day still humming in your bones. You drop your bag, reach to push the flowers into the light, and see the card waiting there like a heartbeat. You read the lines once, then again. Something warm and steady unfurls low in your chest - the precise relief of being chosen and consulted in the same breath. You touch the note with two fingers, smile at the lemon-clean counter you didn’t leave, glance at the hook with the key, and feel the room tilt - just a little - toward home.

⟡ ✿ ✧ ✿ ⟡

He parks under the busted streetlight again, engine off, radio whispering something old. When the back door of the club swings open and you step out - hoodie, tote, makeup mostly gone - he feels that familiar loosening in his chest. “You want fries?” he asks, holding up a greasy paper bag like an offering. “You read my mind,” you say, climbing in. “Hi.” “Hi.” He pulls away from the curb and takes the long road out of town, the one that runs past the shuttered feed mill and the water tower that never quite got repainted. You roll the window down two fingers’ worth and let the night rinse off your hair.

He parks by the old overlook, where the highway turns into a ribbon of red taillights. You kick your shoes off and tuck one foot under you, easy. He opens the bag and takes serious custody of the salt packets. “Serious question,” you tease, stealing a fry before he salts them. “Did you buy extra?” “I bought emotionally,” he tells you. “So yes.” You laugh, and then it is quiet in the good way, the two of you working through the fries like a team with discipline. He keeps glancing at you and then away, like headlights. When he finally sets the bag aside and flattens his palms on his jeans, you know he is finding his words. “It makes me worried sometimes,” he confesses, honest right out of the gate. “And I hate that it does, because it’s a job like any other -” He tugs a sheepish grin. “- just with fewer clothes.” You snort so hard you slap his arm with the back of your hand. “Okay, hallmark. Put that on a mug.” “I’ll get you two” he grins, relieved that you are laughing. He sobers a notch. “I don’t want to be the guy who makes you manage my feelings about your work. That’s on me. If it gets loud in my head, I’ll do the smoke-break thing. Step out. Breathe. Text you I’m okay.” You nod, a small, approving hum. “And I’ll keep the job in its box. No details. If you’re there and a private comes up, I’ll take it if I want it, pass if I don’t. If there’s a night you’d rather not watch the room be the room, tell me and I’ll meet you after. I like that we can say things out loud.” “Me too.” He fiddles with the straw wrapper, then looks up, steady. “I know it’s early. But I like you. I want this to last. I want you to meet my folks - if you’re up for it. I’ll tell them ahead of time. Set it up right. No pressure on you. If it’s weird, we bail. If it’s fine, we stay. We’ll figure it out.”

You hold his gaze, feel the careful sincerity of it land where it should. “Whatever you need from me,” you say. “Tell me. I’ll do it. And I’d love to see you work, by the way. The rodeo. It feels fair, me seeing your world, since you’ve seen mine.” He blows out a breath he’d been pretending he wasn’t holding. “Okay. Saturday. I go on around three. We can meet after the chute dust settles, do the rounds if you want. Or I can run interference.” “Around three. We can meet after the chute dust settles, do the rounds if you want. Or I can run interference,” he offers. “I’m good with whatever,” you answer. “And the out if we need it.” “Always,” he promises, immediate. “We’ll have a code. If you use ‘weather,’ that means you need a porch and air.” “Copy,” you tease, amused. “And if you say ‘fence post,’ I’ll pull you out of a feed talk with a fake call.” He leans back, lets the headrest take some weight. Below you, a semi mutters along the highway. Above, the moon does its best to mind its business. “Also,” you add, a touch tentative, “can I cash in that offer to ask around? For morning work. Bookkeeping. Co-op, hardware, feed store - whatever’s decent. The late nights are… doable. But I’d like more days that end before midnight.” “Absolutely,” he blurts - too fast - then reins it in. “I’ll talk to my aunt at the hardware store. And Perry knows the co-op’s manager. We’ll keep it quiet until you give the go. You tell me what you want me to tell them.” “Thank you,” you murmur. “I like asking you for help and not feeling like it costs me something.” “It never will,” he promises, plain. You nudge his knee with yours. “You’re very good at the grown-up talk.” “I practiced on the drive,” he admits. “To the bag of fries.” You reach over and set your hand over his, palm to palm, the easy, steady fit you were both getting used to. “For what it’s worth,” you say, “you’re allowed to have feelings about my job. You’re just not allowed to make them my problem.” He barks a laugh. “Fair enough.”

You share the last fries like they are witnesses. He tells you about a stubborn calf that figured out how to unlatch the pen and made a nightly habit of joyriding the pasture. You tell him about the new girl on the floor who choreographed to ‘70s soul and made even the bouncers smile. He listens with his whole attention; you give yours back the same way. When the milkshakes are gone and the paper bag is flat and defeated between you, he turns the key just enough to bring the radio back. A soft song comes on, one of the ones with bones. He doesn´t move to start the engine. Neither do you.

“Saturday,” he says, like a promise you can fold in half and put in your pocket. “Saturday,” you echo. He smiles. “And between now and then, I’ll ask around. Aunt Jo first. She’ll grill me. She’s mean in a loving way.” “I can handle mean in a loving way,” you smile. “I have glitter on my resume.” He laughs, tips your hand to his mouth, and presses a brief, grateful kiss to your knuckles - old-fashioned courtesy that never quite went out of him. Then he starts the truck, and you let the road carry you back toward town, toward keys in bowls and labels on jars and the feeling that this thing you are making might actually stay easy because you are both working at it. At your door, he doesn’t rush the goodbye. He touches your cheek once, light, like punctuation rather than a paragraph. “Text me when you’re home,” you say on reflex, then roll your eyes at yourself. “You are home.” He grins. “I’ll text you anyway.” “Do. And tell Aunt Jo I make a mean spreadsheet.” “Yes, ma’am.” You steal one more quick kiss - warm, certain, the kind that makes the hallway smell like salt and something better than luck - and then you are inside, and he is outside with his hat in his hand and a smile he can’t quite lose.

⟡ ✿ ✧ ✿ ⟡

He steps into the kitchen to find the usual rhythms: Royal sorting bolts into an old coffee tin, Cecelia drafting a grocery list like a battle plan. He sets his hat on the counter, drawing breath to speak - “You don’t have to tell me,” Cecelia cuts in, eyes soft but sharp. “I’ve noticed. You’re different. Lighter these days.” He huffs a small laugh. “Yeah. I’m seeing someone. I like her. And I’d like you to meet her.” Royal’s hands still over the tin; Cecelia’s pen pauses mid-checkmark. “All right,” she says, nodding once. “Tell us about her.” “She dances,” he tells them straight up. No hedging. “At the club a few towns over.” Silence does a lap around the room. Royal sets one bolt down, lines it up with the others. “Son…” “I know,” Rhett answers - not combative, just immovable. “I knew it when I met her. It’s her job. She’s good at it, she’s safe in it, she chose it. She’s also funny and smart, and she’s got rules same as we do. I’m not asking you to like the idea. I’m asking you to meet the person.” Cecelia rubs a thumb over the corner of her list. “Are you sure she isn’t - ” she searches for a gentler word and doesn’t find one - “using you?” He huffs a laugh that isn’t cruel. “She makes more money than me, Ma. If anything, she’s spotting me on fries.” He softens. “And I’m not the one she needs anything from. She’s fine. I just want you to know who I’m with.” Royal leans back, chair creaking. “You know folks’ll talk.” “Folks would talk if I brought home a saint,” Rhett scoffs. “I can’t run my life on their opinions. I won’t run hers on ’em, either.”

Perry drifts in like he’s just remembered the concept of coffee. He doesn’t speak - just reaches for a mug and stays within earshot. Backup without a badge. Cecelia exhales, a long, thin stream. “Do you love her?” she asks, then waves herself off. “Too soon - forget I asked.” “It’s early,” Rhett admits. “But I like her real steady. We’re taking it slow. She’s meeting me where I am, and I’m meeting her where she is. We talk like adults. I’m proud of that.” Royal’s jaw works once. “What do you expect from us?” Rhett meets his eyes. “Be normal,” he answers, simple. “Be kind. If it’s too much, we’ll keep it short. If it goes fine, we’ll stay. I don’t need sermons. I need you to trust I’m not walking blind.” Perry finally chimes in, casual as weather. “He’s not,” he says, sipping. “I’ve seen him blind. This ain’t it.” Cecelia’s mouth tips - half worry, half something else. “What’s her name?” Rhett tells her, and the kitchen shifts a degree. Royal taps the rim of the coffee tin. “When?” “Rodeo’s Saturday,” Rhett replies. “I ride around three. I asked her to come. We can meet up after - lots of people, easy out if anybody feels weird.” Cecelia nods, practical mode clicking in like a gear. “Okay. Rodeo is neutral ground.” She pauses. “I’ll bring a pie. Does she like lemon or apple?” “Lemon,” Rhett says, surprised at how sure he is. “And the sunflowers at the market.”

Cecelia writes lemon and underlines it. The pen clicks twice. “We’ll be civil,” she declares, and her voice had found the path between bristle and welcome. “I can’t promise I won’t ask a stupid question. But I’ll try not to.” “That’s all I’m asking,” Rhett says. “And if someone else asks a stupid question, I’ll handle it.” Royal gives one of those small, gruff nods that means he is saying a lot more than he admits. “You get one thing from me,” he says. “Don’t let being lonely make you stupid.” Rhett smiles. “I won’t.” Perry bumps his shoulder on the way past, a brother’s amen. “I’ll stake out the grounds. Run block if needed.” Cecelia tears the grocery list in half and hands a piece to Dad. “Sunflowers,” she speaks, to nobody and everybody. “We can do sunflowers.” Rhett picks up his hat. The room doesn’t feel entirely changed, but it isn’t what it was five minutes ago, either. He takes the little win and doesn’t press for more. “Saturday,” he says. “Saturday,” Cecelia echoes. “We’ll meet her. We’ll be normal.” Royal goes back to his bolts, but his voice follows Rhett to the doorway. “Bring your best ride. And tell her we’re glad to meet who’s making you less ornery.” Rhett grins into the hall. “Yes, sir.”

⟡ ✿ ✧ ✿ ⟡

The fairgrounds are already humming when he pulls in - dust in the air, kids with snow cones, an old PA system clearing its throat. He is half in his head and half in the chute list when a familiar voice cuts through the noise at his shoulder. “Hey, cowboy.” He turns so fast his hat tilts. There you are - leather jacket, white shirt, flare jeans, boots that mean business. Hair loose, a little shine at your mouth from lip balm. You look like the idea of a western that actually holds together. “What are you - ” He catches himself, grinning. “Whatcha doin’ here?” You tip two fingers toward the alley that runs behind the pens. “Marco’s working security today. Used to bounce for us, remembers my good side. He waved me through with a wristband and a ‘tell him to keep his spurs down’.” Rhett huffs a laugh, something like pride sparking behind his ribs. “You look like trouble.” “I am. The fun kind.” You loop your arms around his neck; his hands find your waist. He draws you in and kisses you - quick, sure, sweet, a little claiming. When you part, you smile at him - a little wrecked and a little in love. “You good?” “Better now,” he says, honest as it comes.

There isn’t time for much more - another quick kiss by the rails, your hand squeezing his wrist once like a secret, his thumb brushing your knuckles like he can’t help it. Then the pickup man is calling and the world narrows to rosin, rope, and eight seconds that always ask too much and give just enough back. You slip out the back, find a spot on the rail a section over from where families camp with lawn chairs and coolers. Not hiding - just giving everyone a little air. From there, you can see the gate, the judge’s hand, and the toss of the animal under him. The announcer rolls Rhett’s name like a dare; the chute bangs; the bull blows out and turns hard left. He covers. Not pretty - honest. Shoulders loose, legs talking, free arm drawing circles in the dust and sunlight. The buzzer hits and the whole place lifts with him. He hits dirt, scrambles, runs clean, and when he is safe he doesn't look to the scoreboard first. He looks for you.

You’re already on your feet, laughing a little with relief, hand pressed to your heart. He jogs to the fence, plants a boot in a rung, climbs two bars, and finds your mouth before the dust even settles - quick, grinning, nowhere near enough and exactly right for the public. The section around you whoops. Someone yells, “Get it, cowboy!” and he laughs against your smile. “You were so good,” you breathe, forehead tipping to his like you can steady him with touch. “I get lucky,” he pants, still catching breath. “C’mon. Let´s go meet my folks.” Down the rail, Cecelia, Royal, and Perry watch the whole small miracle - your hand on his cheek, his joy unhidden. Perry grins outright; Royal goes quiet in that way he does when something lands true. And Cecelia feels a hinge in her chest loosen, a little more room made. She’ll meet you as you are, no judgment, because her boy looks happy and that counts for more than the story she told herself before. He drops back to the dirt, jogs the curve of the fence, and meets you at the gate. With a grin, he slides his hands to your waist and lifts you down off the rail - easy, like you’re the only thing he trusts to carry - setting you soft onto your boots. His hand stays at your waist and doesn't go far after that - sometimes around your back, sometimes linked with your fingers, like he is making sure you are never out of reach and never held too tight. You let him; it feels like the right size of steady.

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They’re waiting at a cluster of picnic benches like you all planned it that way - Cecelia setting down two foil-tented pies, Perry muscling a cooler into the shade, Royal with his hands on his hips, assessing and pretending he isn’t. “Ma, Dad,” Rhett says, voice easy. “This is -” he says your name like a good word, “- and these are my folks.” You don’t hesitate. You step straight to Cecelia, arms open. She startles, then smiles and gathers you in. “Oh,” she says, hands settling on your shoulders. “You’re warm.” “So are you,” you answer, like sharing an inside joke. “Thanks for meeting me.” Cecelia lifts the foil with ceremony. “Lemon or apple?” she asks - because she’s that kind of woman. “I brought both.” Perry pops the cooler lid, ice rattling, and grins like he’s been waiting to hand you a water all day. Royal gives a small, approving nod that says he’s taking the measure and likes what he finds. Rhett keeps a palm at the small of your back, fingers finding yours a beat later, and the bench becomes the easiest place in the world to sit.

“You ride good,” Royal tells Rhett, and then turns to you, “You look like you know how to spot a good tomato.” “I do,” you answer. “I also label leftovers. It’s a condition.” Perry chokes on a laugh. “He’s doomed,” he announces, delighted. “In a good way.” “So,” Cecelia says, slicing the pie like a diplomat, “you… ah…” She searches for something delicate and lands on honesty. “Do you ever - good grief, I’m going to ask this wrong - do you ever feel like folks are… looking at you for the wrong thing?” You could bristle. You don’t. You laugh softly - not at her, but at the question’s awkward boots. “All the time,” you answer, easy, handing her the knife to show you trust her hands. “At the club, that’s part of the ticket. But I set the rules there. Outside, I’m just a person in a hoodie who wants fries and a bed by midnight. And I’m doing bookkeeping part-time for a salon, looking for more of that. Numbers look at me for the right reasons.” Cecelia blinks, then smiles, relief smoothing something in her. “Numbers do have manners,” she says. “I like you.” “I like you, too,” you reply - and mean it. Royal hands Rhett a plate, then jerks his chin toward you with a kind of cautious affection. “You’ve got him laughing more,” he tells you. “We notice.” “Good,” you smile, like you’ve been handed a job you want. “He’s very good at making other people breathe easier. Someone should return the favor.”

You all eat pie that’s too sweet and perfect anyway. People drift by to clap Rhett on the shoulder; he fields it with his usual patience, always circling back to your side like he’s installed a compass for it. When someone asks if you’re his girl, he says, “Yes, sir,” without a flinch, and you feel the little click of a thing settling into one of its truest names. Cecelia does ask one more clumsy question about the club - some version of “how long do you think you’ll keep at it?” - and you just laugh again, gentle. “’Til I don’t want to,” you say. “And I don’t make big decisions when I’m tired. Right now I like the stage and the girls and the rules. I also like mornings. I’m letting both be true.” “That’s… very reasonable,” she admits, almost impressed with herself for hearing it. “Reasonable’s my brand,” you grin, nudging Rhett’s hip with yours. “His too.” “Sometimes,” Perry mutters. “With supervision.” They all laugh, even Royal, and then there are introductions to Aunt Jo at the table over - you tell her you “make a mean spreadsheet,” and she barks back, “Good, I make a mess,” and takes your number - and the sky settles toward late-day gold, and Rhett’s hand never really leaves you: fingers linked, palm at your waist, forearm brushing yours. Not because you need guarding. Because it feels good to have an always. When the band strikes up by the beer tent, Cecelia leans in and kisses your cheek, quick and soft. “Lemon suits you,” she says. “Sunflowers suit you,” you return, nodding at the stems peeking from her tote. “Thank you for seeing me and not the rumors.” “Thank you for letting me learn out loud,” she thanks you, and pats your hand - an apology shaped like affection. Rhett looks between you like a man who’s brought the right horse to the right ranch. “Walk?” he asks, thumb pressing once at your side. “Walk,” you say, and you go - through dust and laughter and the easy goodbyes between family - his hand finding yours again like it’s been there all along.

He walks you to his truck and opens the passenger door for you to climb in. You drive home with the windows cracked and dust still in their hair, grinning like the day doesn’t know how to quit. His hand rides the console the whole way, palm up, so you can lay your fingers there when the road goes straight. He drives both of you to your place. You both laugh your way through the door. He drops his hat on the hook and you tug him in by the shirt, a quick kiss that lands like a thank-you and a dare. “You rode well,” you murmur against his mouth. “Got lucky,” he says, already smiling. “My turn,” you decide, playful. “Rules are simple. We are home,” the word hits clean in his chest, “you can touch wherever you want.” “Yes, ma’am,” he says, voice gone warm. You cue a song with bones on your phone and let the little speaker turn the room amber. Jacket off, hair down, you step between his knees where he’s perched on the arm of the couch and start slow - hips keeping time, shoulders easy, a smile that’s all private. He laughs once, delighted and helpless, and then goes quiet the way good men do when they’re paying attention. You lean in, let your weight find him an inch at a time; he exhales, hands steady at your waist. When his thumbs press, careful, you nod. “That’s good,” you say, and he flushes like you gave him a ribbon. You turn, back to his chest, and let your spine fit the length of him, rolling your shoulders to the beat until he has to breathe deeper just to keep up. It’s heat without hurry, the kind of close that makes the room smaller and kinder. “Okay?” you check, turning your head. His jaw is tight with trying to be respectful and you love him for it. “So okay,” he manages, a little broken around the edges.

You laugh, spin back to face him, and straddle his lap, settling there like it’s the most natural thing in the world. His hands stay where you left them until you lift them until they are not. He moves both hands to your face and the permission is written in the way you tip your face into his palms. The kiss that follows is slow and sure, a long yes that doesn’t need a witness. When the song fades, you don’t move away. You stay right there, forehead to his, catching breath together. He’s looking at you like he’s memorizing - like he’s been trying not to say something for days and finally found the right room for it. “I think it’s obvious,” he starts, then swallows, gathers himself. “But I wanted to say it so you actually know.” You go still, soft. “I’m in love with you,” he says, simple as a fence post set straight. “I am. I know it’s early to some people. I know it’s fast. But it’s true in me, and I’d kick myself if I didn’t put it in the air where you could reach it.” Your smile happens before you can decide on it. It feels like a door opening to a porch you’ve been building together by accident. “Thank you for saying it,” you whisper, thumb brushing his cheekbone. “I’m in love with you, too.”

Something like relief and wonder breaks across his face. He laughs - quiet, disbelieving - and hauls you closer, arms around you without an ounce of doubt now. You tuck your chin on his shoulder and breathe him in: soap, dust, lemon pie you can’t stop laughing about. He doesn’t let go; he doesn’t need to. You trade small, silly kisses - cheek, nose, the corner of a smile - and a handful of giggles that would embarrass both of you anywhere but here. “Stay?” you ask, softer than the lights outside your window. “Just sleep,” he echoes, grinning. “Just sleep,” you agree, and somehow it sounds like a bigger promise. He takes off his pants, you put on a big shirt, he turns off the lamp. In bed you fold into the familiar arrangement - your leg over his, his arm under your neck - and let the day drain out. He whispers one more “I am in love with you” into your hair like a habit he plans to keep; you say it back like you’ve been waiting to. Morning will bring coffee and chores and a text to Aunt Jo about bookkeeping hours. Tonight brings nothing but the good quiet, his heartbeat steady under your ear and your fingers laced in his, both of you finally, fully sure.

#outer range x reader

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#outer range x reader