Identity Crisis (BWWM) COMPLETE

Chapter Twenty-Four: Falling

She couldn't sleep, and quite frankly, she didn't understand how in the hell her husband's eyes were even closed. She was determined to spend as much time with him as possible. She was tracing his features with a finger lightly, smiling softly to herself. He was still so beautiful, even in his sleep. She cooed as her finger scrolled carefully over his eyelids, remembering his kind, hazel eyes. Her finger trailed to his perfect, pink lips, and Naomi leaned to kiss them. What she didn't expect was a response, and jumped away.

"Babe," she whispered, making sure she wasn't just crazy.

"Yes?" He answered with a small laugh.

"You scared me!" She screeched as Joshua sat up, his hand on her thigh under the cover.

"I'm sorry, but you have been touching me for at least an hour and a half."

"And you've been up the whole time?"

"No. It's actually very relaxing, but when you touched my eye, it made me wake up," Joshua smiled softly. Naomi couldn't help but smile back as Joshua pulled her back closer to him, holding her in his arms as he leaned against the headboard, his hand on her protruded stomach.

"Why aren't you sleeping, honey?" He questioned in the night.

"You know why," Naomi muttered back as she turned slightly to meet his eyes. "I'm scared."

"Baby," Joshua sighed as he kissed her forehead. "I will be back, we will spend every waking second together until I assure you that this isn't a dream, and that nothing happened to me."

"I know, babe, and I know you will return to me, it's just..." she trailed with a huff as she felt her tears gathering again.

"It's what?"

"It's... we've only been together for two and a half years, Josh! I've only had thirty months with you, only two birthdays, two Christmases, three New Years, two Thanksgivings, it's not enough!" She protested. "It's not enough for me. Your family has had thirty-five, almost thirty-six years with you. I want that, I want to have you for thirty-six years. I want to experience thirty-six more birthdays with you, and this is jeopardizing my time. You know I love you, Josh, I'm sick with love, and... I don't know," Naomi sighed. She had been talking about she and Joshua and the bumps in their relationship for what seemed like forever, and what was supposed to be a fun getaway quickly turned into another bump. She was tired of the bumps, she just wanted to love him.

"I promise you at the very least another thirty-six years, honey, I just have to do this for today. It's one meeting, one hour, and I'm back to you. We have two more days to spend together here, and I will make those the best two days you have ever spent with me," he assured, or at least tried to. Naomi buried her head into his chest as she lifted his hand in hers and gripped tightly.

"I'm scared," she repeated lowly. "What do you want from me? How do you want me to process this without freaking out?"

"Babe, it's okay to freak out. I probably would if this situation was reversed."

"I'm sorry," she huffed as she lifted her eyes to his, then framing his face with her right hand. "I love you, Joshua. I love you so much that I'm hurting, hurting ridiculously bad right now. I want to be happy, I want to not think about it, but it's not that easy," Naomi huffed. She searched Joshua's eyes and could sense a slight bit of fear, but she knew that as he searched hers, he would encounter immense amounts of fear.

Suddenly, Joshua leaned down and kissed her lips. With as much passion as he could muster, he kissed her hard. He wanted to kiss her uncertainty away, all he ever wanted to do was comfort her, and that's why he kissed her in such a way. Joshua pulled away once he noticed both of their lungs laboring harder than they had to, and smiled softly at her.