So deeply, delightfully sore. Sore in a way that has, all morning, been a small private heat under my skin that reminds me, every time I move, that two nights ago Atlas Graves was inside me for what felt like several hours of my life. The body keeps the receipt.
I have not said one word about it.
I am notgoingto say one word about it. Margot, currently bending over a peony with shears the size of her forearm, is six feet away from me and has the maternal radar of a woman who has been raising me one way or another since I was sixteen. If I sit wrong on the patio stones, she’s so in tune to me I swear she would hear it.
She straightens. Wipes the back of her wrist across her forehead.
"How was Wren?"
"...good."
"You haven't said much about her since you got back."
"There's not much to tell. It was nice."
"Did she cook for you? You said she was going to try."
"...yeah. Pasta."
"What kind?"
I blow out a breath. I should have prepped for the third degree. Now I’m going to have to improvise.
"...with the red sauce. I don't know, Mom."
"Was the couch comfortable, sweetheart? You know she could've called us, we'd have come and picked you up."
"It was fine. I slept fine."
"Hmm."
"What?"
"You sound tired, sweetheart."
"It was late."
"Speaking of late."
She straightens. Presses a hand to her lower back. Looks at me with the soft careful attention she has been turning on me increasingly often since the family vacation.
"What about the workouts?" Her eyes narrow on me.
I freeze with my hand around a stubborn dandelion root. "...workouts?"
"You told me, on the phone, the other night. That you and Wren had just come back from a run?"
I do not look up. "Oh, yeah. That." I feel the heat of embarrassment flood through me. My cheeks have to be bright red.
"At eleven o'clock, honey?"
"It's a—college thing. Everyone's doing it. I told you."
"You told me a lot of things on that phone call, sweetheart, very quickly."
"...did I?"
"Mm-hm."
