“I saw. I admired it.”
Under the table her foot hooks around my ankle. “Your mother would hate me,” she says.
“My mother would be terrified of you, therealyou,” I say. “It’s one of your best qualities.”
“One of?”
“I’m keeping the list to myself. You’ll get complacent.”
She steals the last bite of pasta off my plate instead, like it’s half hers now. Maybe it is, because for the last few weeks — and especially since that night in the kitchen — she’s been the easiest breath I take all day.
A buzzing sound travels down the table. When I look, Seb’s phone is lit up, and he picks it up to see who’s calling. I know itcan’t be Ivy this time, and yet he still makes a strange face before he silences the phone and puts it face down.
The night goes on. Sloane is loud and laughing and entirely herself. She’s here, full volume, one of the group, and I’m not having to steady anything. I don’t know what to do with that.
It’s just… nice.
The noise ebbs and flows — Luca mentions his family visiting this weekend — and the apple pies arrive looking like evidence from an arson investigation: charred on one side, pale on the other.
“They’re rustic,” Luca announces.
“Destroyed,” Theo says.
“That one’s still smoking, Luca,” Ivy says, pointing.
“Health code’s just a suggestion,” I say.
He puts the tray down and we eat. When the desserts are done, the playlist goes softer, and I step out onto the back porch for air, but Seb is already there, phone pressed to his ear, back to me, shoulders hunched.
“I know,” he’s saying, low. “Just — think about it, Mom. Please.”
I try to walk back inside without him noticing, because I’ve stumbled onto a private moment, but he turns and sees me. The look in his eyes is the one he gives an opponent on the ice before he buries them into the boards, but then he blinks and it’s gone.
He pockets the phone. “Just my mom.”
“Cool.” I nod and give him a second to say more, but he doesn’t.
I’ll find him later, and I’ll ask if he’s okay, and he’ll say nothing, and I’ll wait, and eventually he’ll tell me. It’s what I do, but it’s also what he does. So we walk back inside together, the warmth and noise hitting us all over again.
By now, Luca is holding court at the cleared end of the table, retelling a story from one of last year’s away trips with freshembellishments, pulling Niko into the telling so he doesn’t drift away.
He makes it look careless, but his eyes sweep the room as he tells the story, refilling glasses and cracking a smile at those who are quiet. It’s like his superpower: every time he notices someone’s mood dropping, he zeroes in on them until they’re right back in and smiling.
And he’s just as important to the group as I am.
Just different.
“So,” Luca says, as if he’s reading my mind. “Niko.”
“Luca,” Niko says.
“The girl at Maple & Main,” Luca says. “Update.”
“There is no update.”
“You were there three times last week.”
“I like the coffee.”
