“Here you go.”
“Thanks.” Her eyes lit up. “You know when you doomscroll and find stupid things to buy on the internet?”
“A time or two.”
“Well”—she took another bite—“I got this little projector. It was total crap, but I loved the concept.”
She licked the pad of her thumb and I had to swallow extra hard to get my own bite down. How on earth was this woman so effortlessly sexy?
“I upgraded and it’s the best thing ever.” She sipped her wine and set it on the end table.
The screen filled with the opening scene in a slick nightclub.
She scrunched down on the couch and Mouse put his head on her thigh, hoping he was cute enough to get a nibble.
I pulled a hassock over that looked like it was reupholstered with an old quilt. A fuzzy maroon blanket was folded on top. She didn’t even look away from the screen, just lifted her plate for me to toss the blanket over her and myself.
And we ate the pizza and watched a ridiculous action movie from the early ’90s.
When she fell asleep against me, I’d never been more content in my whole damn life.
The streaming service auto-played another movie, but I didn’t pay attention to it. My brain was tugging at more small town ideologies. They added to the kernels from the day before.
Slowly building toward a town complicit in the secrets of the lake.
I wasn’t sure how long I spun the ideas around until Mouse nudged my hand.
“Need to go out?”
His tail thumped.
I eased out from under Phoebe and settled her on the couch with the blanket. I let Mouse out and then cleaned up the kitchen.
I noticed a cheap spiral bound notebook by her makeshift charging station. She had an iPad and her phone plugged into slots. A basket of pens, colored pencils, and crayons of all things was beside it.
Maybe if I just wrote a few things down…
I filled up five pages in my shorthand before I heard scratching at the door.
“Sorry, buddy,” I said when I opened the door.
He trotted in and gave me a look.
“I suppose you’re hungry?”
His tail wagged.
I took the notebook with me as I re-read what I wrote and filled his bowl, then set it down on the mat with bones on it. Because of course she had that for him.
I leaned on the kitchen island, scribbling down a few more ideas as they came.
I told myself even stupid ideas were better than no ideas.
Was the story too cliché?
“Fix it later,” I mumbled.
Maybe I should leave her on the couch and go back to my place. But doing that felt wrong. Not only leaving her, but the idea didn’t have enough merit yet.
