And last, it was after Deke and I camped out in front of his small television which was fed from a satellite dish and we watched The Professional.
One of my favorite movies.
And I’d found it was one of Deke’s favorites too.
I also found that Deke’s face got soft when he noticed me crying when Léon had to let Mathilda go down the exhaust chute. It got soft right before he pulled me out of my corner of the couch into him in his and he held me throughout the rest of the movie (so he didn’t see when I started crying again later, though with the way he started tangling his fingers in my hair, I think he guessed).
It was dinnertime and I was sitting cross-legged on his couch, watching him in his tiny kitchen frying bologna and making toast.
Frying bologna and making toast.
The girls had brought huge amounts of food. So much of it, some of it was taking up what little counter space Deke had. They hadn’t prepared us for a few nights hanging at Deke’s trailer. They’d prepared us for a three-month-long siege.
And he was making me fried bologna on toast, the American cheese slices out and at the ready.
Just like I’d told him I liked it.
It was with that—not to mention every moment of that day since I heard Deke’s bellow at the police station—that I knew.
I could do his boundaries.
No.
I could so totally do his boundaries.
Sure, those boundaries didn’t include sex and a possible future that included me birthing big baby boys with hazel eyes.
But with all Deke gave me, the care, the cuddling, the protection, the cuddling (worth a second mention since Deke was so good at it), making me feel the impossible after what had happened—safe in his sphere and especially in his arms—I could take that.
I had a lot of friends and family who loved me. The closest of them would do all the same things.
Deke was a part of that now. As were Krystal, Lauren, Twyla and the new addition of Lexie.
The girls didn’t offer cuddles (though, all but Krys and Twyla, I was sure they would if Deke wasn’t already providing that). But them kicking in like they did was super-cool.
And even with my newfound acceptance of what Deke was willing to give me, I knew there’d be a day when he’d find someone, or I would, and that cuddle-type closeness would have to go.
But he’d been there in every way I could need someone, and then some, on a day which, outside the ones I lost people I cared about, was the worst of my life.
So yeah.
I could do his boundaries.
Especially if it came with fried bologna sandwiches in his kickass trailer.
This thought made me look around his space yet again.
I found I was not wrong on first, second, third (etc.) perusal.
I loved every inch of his trailer.
It had not been a surprise that he lived in a travel trailer in the middle of nowhere but right by a beautiful lake. I didn’t even spy a single house built around that lake. It seemed it was just Deke and his trailer.
And all of this seemed just so Deke.
Deke living isolated and on wheels. He sets that trailer to his truck, he’s good to go.
I loved that about him. I loved that he was a man like no man I’d ever met and all of it was interesting, a lot of it was sweet, some of it was funny, the entirety of it good.
I felt a smile play at my lips as I glanced around and noted he was not only good to go but good to do it in style.
The interior of the trailer was like a museum of the road and an inner guide to Deke’s psyche.
There were posters of rallies, music festivals and concerts glued to the walls. And if these posters were any indication, he not only had really good taste in music, he’d traveled far and wide and back again about fifteen times.
Just like me.
There were also stickers tacked everywhere for everything from bike shops to bars to diners to coffee houses.
Further, there was a bevy of bumper stickers that ranged from the hilarious to the profound. Like one that had a Star Wars Storm Trooper face on it and next to that “I had friends on that Death Star.” And another one that said, “The gene pool could use a little chlorine.” And another that said, “Contrary to belief, no one owes you anything.”
Then there were the random quotes, like Walt Whitman’s “Resist much. Obey little.” And Kurt Vonnegut’s “I want to stand as close to the edge as I can without going over. Out on the edge you can see all kinds of things you can’t see from the center.”
I saw Clint Eastwood behind the long barrel of a gun. Bruce Lee in the zone. James Dean leaning against a car. A fake baseball card with Will Farrell in a Cub’s uniform.
All this was intermingled with liberal Americana. Eagles. Flags. Stars. Uncle Sam. Rosie the Riveter. “Don’t Tread on Me.” “Liberty or Death.” Not to mention, the every real biker’s maxim, “Ride free or die.”
And this was Deke’s wallpaper, from living room space to bedroom space and even in the miniscule bathroom.
It.
Fucking.
Rocked.
“Your trailer fucking rocks,” I told him and his gaze went from the frying pan to me.
“Come again?”
“Your trailer…fucking…rocks,” I repeated, grinning at him. “I could say the Storm Trooper bumper sticker is my favorite but I could also say Coelho’s ‘Don’t waste your time with explanations…’ is my favorite because people do only hear what they want to hear.”
Deke stared at me.