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“Are you kidding?” I ask. “I’m getting that on a plaque.”
“Please don’t.”
“I won’t put it up somewhere embarrassing,” I tease, kissing one more finger.
“No plaques. Please?”
“No plaques if you stay over,” I say.
“Only if we sleep in the same bed this time,” she says. “Do you still have that extra toothbrush?”I’m not used to anyone else being in my bed. To put it mildly, it has been a while since I dated anyone, so when I wake up with June’s hair in my face, I have no idea where I am.
Then she turns to face me, and I remember. She opens her eyes slowly, two pools of pure, vibrant blue, and I lean in, kiss her on the forehead.
“Morning,” I say.
June glares daggers.
“What,” she says, then rolls over and falls back asleep.
I make a mental note: not a morning person, and then I go back to sleep myself.“You fixed the window,” June says. She’s sitting on my bed cross-legged, leaning back on her hands, looking at the window that had a tree branch through it a few weeks ago.
“Yes, I fixed a broken window,” I say, pulling a shirt over my head. “Is that a surprise?”
“Not when you put it like that,” she says, smiling.
“How do you feel about eggs and pancakes?” I ask, pulling my hair back into a knot.
“Positively.”
“Would you like some before I take you home?” I ask, leaning over the bed.
“That sounds lovely,” she says, and gives me a lingering kiss.
I practically float down the stairs on a cloud, humming some tune that I made up as I descend the final few steps into the living room.
And then I stop dead in my tracks, because Caleb is sitting on one of my couches, laptop open on his lap.
“Hey,” he says, nodding without looking up.
I stand there, frozen. I think agog is the word.
There’s no way I can tell anyone. Not yet. Especially someone who knows Silas pretty well, such as one of my brothers.
After a moment he glances up at me, then frowns.
“You okay?” he asks.
“Yeah,” I say.
“I just let myself in,” he says, jerking a thumb over his shoulder at the front door. “It’s still cool if I crash here for the weekend, right? I don’t know if I can spend five more minutes in Warwick, and I really need to work on my dissertation.”
Finally, I remember, and I heave a deep breath. Right. It’s the weekend, and Caleb is going to stay here because my house is quiet and peaceful and, according to him, it’s the best place to think deep math thoughts.
“Yes, right,” I say. “Of course. Certainly. But I just realized that I forgot something upstairs in my bedroom so I’m just going to go back up there and—”
“Is my shirt down there?” June shouts.
Caleb’s eyebrows go up so fast they nearly shoot off his face, and I clear my throat.
“No,” I call back.
“Never mind, found it,” she says. “But did I leave my socks—”
“My brother’s here,” I shout up.
Silence.
Then: “Which one?”
“Caleb.”
“Hello,” Caleb calls, already shutting his laptop. “This seems like it’s a bad time.”
Then he stands and looks at me, lowers his voice.
“June?” he asks me.
I clear my throat.
“Yes,” I confirm. “And I’d appreciate it if you kept this to yourself.”
Caleb raises one eyebrow and looks very, very amused.
“You mean if I kept it secret from Silas,” he says.
“Keeping it to yourself includes keeping it from Silas, yes,” I say.
The bedroom door opens. June emerges, comes down the stairs.
“Hi, Caleb,” she says, smiling just a little bit too much.
“Good morning,” he says. “How are you?”
“I’m well,” she says. “Yourself?”
I don’t think I’ve ever seen Caleb look more entertained in my entire life.
“Oh, quite well,” he says. “I’m doing so well right now, June. It’s nice to see you. Also, surprising.”
“Likewise,” June deadpans. “Levi’s given you a key and told you to drop by whenever, I presume?”
“Yes to the key, no to the whenever,” he says. “In fact, Levi was fully aware that I was coming this morning to spend the weekend at his house, and it looks like he forgot.”
Now they’re both looking at me: June with one eyebrow raised, and Caleb grinning like he’s won the lottery. Which, in Loveless terms, he kind of has.
“I’m afraid my social calendar got somewhat scrambled,” I say to both of them, rubbing my knuckles on my forehead. “Caleb, would you like pancakes?”
“I would love pancakes,” he says, and puts his laptop bag back down.
June turns to me.
“Can I call my parents from your landline so they don’t think I’ve been murdered or kidnapped?” she asks.
I nearly ask the two of them if we should just run an ad in the local paper about June spending the night, but I bite my tongue.
“Of course,” I say.“Wait, I didn’t hear about any of this,” June is saying, pointing the tines of her fork at me. “They weren’t actually together when they went public with their relationship, and then they were fake-together but also really together, but still pretending to be fake together and not actually together?”
