Falling Into Routine
Copyright© 2025 by ChillWriter338
Chapter 28: Rebuilding in Silence
Romantic Sex Story: Chapter 28: Rebuilding in Silence - Childhood friends looking for true love and ready to start a family deny how perfect a couple they would make together by getting as close as possible. The secret plan to keep from falling into each other's arms - follow the same routine. Re-write so read from the beginning.
Caution: This Romantic Sex Story contains strong sexual content, including Ma/Fa Consensual Romantic Heterosexual Fiction FemaleDom Light Bond Polygamy/Polyamory Black Male Hispanic Female Masturbation Oral Sex Voyeurism Big Breasts Size 2nd POV Slow
The light in Eli’s kitchen flickered on and stayed on.
Mama Caceres didn’t see it, but she felt it—somewhere behind her ribs, the kind of flicker that wasn’t electrical at all. She didn’t look back. She simply rinsed the pot, dried her hands, and sat down in the kitchen she had just filled with comfort food and memories.
He was still in there. Still hurting. But he’d moved. That was enough for now.
Carla came in half an hour later. Hair still damp from the misty air, shoes kicked off at the front mat, phone untouched in her pocket. Her body moved like it was heavier than it used to be—each step full of wear and ache.
The scent stopped her first. Garlic, onion, cumin. A touch of vinegar. Chicken stewed long enough to fall apart with a spoon. She should’ve felt comfort. Instead, her chest ached.
He’s still in there. He didn’t throw the food away. Didn’t shut the blinds or lock me out. That has to mean something ... doesn’t it?
“Smells good,” she said quietly.
Mama smiled without looking up. “There’s a plate in the oven.”
Carla opened it. The warmth hit her face like an embrace. Rice. Chicken. Sweet onion and plantain. Her comfort foods—her mother’s way of holding her when words didn’t reach.
How many times had this saved me growing up? I’d sit here, silent and moody after a bad game or a fight with a girl or a dumb screw-up, and Mama would just ... feed me. Not coddle. Not interrogate. Just give me space to feel like myself again.
“You always know,” Carla said, closing her eyes for a second. “Even when I don’t say anything.”
“You don’t have to say,” Mama replied. “I was young once too.”
Carla leaned against the counter, staring at the steam rising from the food. Her jaw clenched tight, like she was holding something in. She didn’t even know what—anger, maybe. Guilt, definitely. Regret so sharp it felt like glass behind her ribs.
I shouldn’t have pushed. I thought I could carry all of it—him, Mama, Yenni, the feelings. The sex. The need. All of it. I thought if I held on tight enough, no one would fall. But I’m the one who cracked.
“He’s not okay,” she said, trying to keep her voice steady.
“I know.”
“I don’t think I am either.”
Mama stood and walked over, wiping her hands on her apron before reaching up to cup Carla’s cheek. Her palm was warm, soft. Familiar. That single touch cracked something loose inside.
“Then don’t pretend. Sit down. Eat. Cry. Sleep. Whatever you need.”
Carla nodded, throat tight, and took her seat at the small kitchen table. The chair groaned beneath her, like it recognized her weight as something more than physical. She stared at the plate.
I don’t deserve this. I don’t deserve comfort when I’m the one who broke him. But I want it anyway. I want something to ground me before I drift too far out.
Mama sat across from her and sipped from her coffee, watching quietly as Carla slowly began to eat.
One bite at a time. That’s all I can do. One bite and maybe the next. Maybe it’ll taste like love instead of shame. Maybe it’ll remind me I’m still here. That I can still try.
They sat in silence for a while, only the sound of fork and knife tapping against ceramic.
Then Carla whispered, “I’m scared, Mama.”
Mama didn’t ask of what. She waited.
“I’m scared we broke it. That we flew too close to something perfect and now it’s all crashing down.”
“You didn’t break it, mija. You shook it. Maybe bent it. But things that are real ... they bend. They don’t shatter.”
Carla looked up, her eyes glassy.
But what if it’s me? What if I’m the one that can’t bend anymore?
“Even people?”
“Especially people.”
Mama reached across and took Carla’s hand. “You’re not alone. You never were. Not when you chose him. Not when he pulled back. Not even now.”
Carla squeezed her hand. “I want to fix it.”
“Then you will.”
A silence settled between them—this time softer. Less heavy. Like breath returning to a room that had been held too tight.
Maybe we haven’t lost it. Maybe we just stopped listening long enough to forget we were in the same room. I can listen now. I can fight for it. I can fight for us.
Mama cleared the dishes without a word.
Carla tried to help, but Mama waved her off and pointed to the chair with a look that brooked no argument. So she sat—barefoot, arms loose in her lap, stomach full but far from settled.
The sink ran for a while. Then stopped.
The clink of silverware. The slow stretch of the faucet’s neck. The soft hiss of the burner as Mama reheated coffee, not for need, but for the ritual of it.
“I used to think,” Carla said slowly, “that if I just held everything together hard enough, it’d stay whole.”
Mama didn’t look up. She poured the reheated coffee into two mugs and set one in front of Carla. Then she sat.
“You were always like that,” Mama said. “Even as a niña. Stubborn. Determined. Proud. You wanted to tie the whole world together with your own hands.”
Carla wrapped her fingers around the mug. “Is that so bad?”
“No. It’s beautiful. But it’s dangerous when you forget to leave space for other hands.”
I did forget. I thought I was the only one who could hold the threads together. That if I let go, we’d all fall apart. Maybe I didn’t trust them enough to carry any of it. Maybe I didn’t trust myself to share it.
“I thought I was protecting you,” Carla said. “Keeping things moving. Holding Eli up, keeping Yenni at bay, pretending I had it all handled.”
Mama’s eyebrows lifted. “Mija ... who asked you to carry all that?”
Carla opened her mouth, then closed it again. She didn’t have an answer. Not one that made sense.
“It just ... felt like it was mine to carry.”
“It’s not,” Mama said, gently but firmly. “And it never was.”
Carla looked away. “I thought maybe I was like you.”
Mama tilted her head. “You are like me. But even I never did it alone. I had sisters. Friends. And I learned when to ask for help, even when it burned my tongue.”
Carla swallowed. “I didn’t know how to ask.”
“I know,” Mama said. “That’s why I cooked.”
A soft, unsteady laugh escaped Carla’s chest. “You always know how to make it feel less like failing.”
“It’s not failing. It’s just ... letting someone else take the wheel for a minute.”
Carla sipped the coffee. It was strong. Sweet. The kind that clung to the back of the tongue like memory.
After a long pause, she asked, “What about Yenni?”
Mama didn’t answer right away. She folded her hands in her lap and studied Carla’s face.
“What about her?”
“I’ve been so angry at her. For watching. For wanting. For not being honest. But I see her. I see how alone she is.”
“Good,” Mama said. “Because she’s not just angry. Or jealous. She’s scared.”
Carla’s voice turned quiet. “I was scared too.”
“Still are,” Mama said. “But the difference is, you’re not hiding anymore.”
Yenni is. She’s always just behind the curtain, just outside the door. Watching, aching. Wanting something she thinks she doesn’t deserve.
“Do you think she could be part of this?” Carla asked.
“I think she already is,” Mama said softly. “But you have to make space. Not rescue her. Not force her. Just ... make space.”
Carla sat back, her eyes unfocused.
There’s a version of this story where we all lose. Where the shame wins. Where the hurt curdles and turns us against each other. But maybe there’s another version—one where we listen better. One where the women aren’t rivals, but a circle.
“I don’t want to go back,” Carla said suddenly. “Not to how it was before. Not with Eli at the center like a sun we all have to orbit.”
Mama nodded. “Then don’t. Build something new. With each other. For each other.”
The front door creaked faintly—maybe the wind, maybe not.
Neither of them turned.
Carla reached across the table again, and this time it was her hand that found Mama’s.
Not a daughter reaching for a mother.
A woman reaching for another woman.
Someone she could build with.
The coffee was long gone, but neither of them moved.
Carla had pulled her knees into the chair, arms resting loosely on her thighs, head tilted as she watched the light shift in the kitchen window. Mama had taken off her apron and tied her curls up into a loose knot, the kind she always wore when the work was done but the night wasn’t over.
“I ever tell you about Silvia Ortega?” Mama asked, stretching her back with a soft grunt.
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