Mornings always started slow.

Not because either of you were late sleepers—John liked getting up early to scribble thoughts into his tattered Moleskine, and you always woke to sunlight and coffee—but because being beside each other made rushing feel... unnecessary.

Most nights, he stayed at your place. Your bed was bigger, your windows faced the east, and he liked the way your apartment smelled like vanilla and old books. The truth? His place had paper-thin walls and a radiator that made dying-animal sounds. You never complained, but he noticed how you curled tighter into yourself there. So he started packing a bag and crashing at yours “for a night or two,” which became weeks.

He’d wake first—always. John was soft-footed in the mornings, trying not to wake you as he padded to the kitchen in boxers and a hoodie. He’d put on that weird jazz playlist you insisted you hated, and still kept. Then: pour-over coffee. One mug black for him. One with oat milk, two sugars, and a cinnamon sprinkle for you, which he never forgot. Not once.

He didn’t cook much—but he could toast a mean bagel and scramble eggs. On Sundays, you’d take over, dancing barefoot in the kitchen while making Turkish eggs or that weird vegan pancake recipe you both pretended tasted better than it did. He’d lean on the counter, chin in his hand, watching you with that look again. Like maybe this was all he ever wanted.

Midday? Work. Life. Reality.

You worked in design—something creative, demanding, and deeply people-focused. John had gigs here and there: teaching acting workshops, auditioning, working part-time at a bookstore on Bleecker. Sometimes you both had hectic days, running parallel lives. Sometimes you met for lunch—shared tacos on a bench in Washington Square, your knees touching, his arm slung around your shoulder even when he talked with his mouth full.

He wasn’t flashy, and he didn’t try to impress. That was what made you trust him.

Evenings belonged to you both.

Sometimes it was takeout on the floor, wine from a mason jar, and a movie you’d pause fifteen times because one of you needed to talk. Sometimes it was more tender: John massaging your shoulders as you vented about your day, whispering "You’re killing it, babe," against your ear. Other nights it was fighting—softly, always softly—about silly things. Who left the cap off the toothpaste. Why he never charged his phone. But even those moments ended with hands held across the pillows, eyes locked in the dark.

Night always came gently.

You’d fall asleep curled together, your back against his chest, his hand beneath your shirt, resting flat and warm against your belly. He wasn’t the type to talk about forever. But he held you like someone who was already sure of it.

And in the quiet, ordinary rhythm of it all—the coffee, the subway rides, the messy kitchen counters, the tangled sheets—he loved you the way people in cities love parks: like sanctuary carved out of chaos.

Typical didn’t mean boring. It meant home.