On my Saturday-morning run with Banks, I replay in my mind the dancing videos that I watched last night. And again this morning while doing laps in the pool at the gym. I try to remember the moves now as we pass the horse farm, where a majestic chestnut creature nibbles on grass.
We’ve reached the part of the run where silence cloaks us, and that’s fine by me.
I picture taking a step forward, a step back—then what’s next?
My thoughts are interrupted by a loud bark.
Banks laughs affectionately. “Hudson, he’s twenty times bigger than you,” he says to the black-and-white dog he’s running with—Ripley’s dog. Though maybe it’s his dog now too.
Hudson barks again at the horse, who whinnies and wanders off in his pasture, even though we keep moving.
“Twenty? Not sure if your math is mathing,” I say.
“It’s artistic license. Deal with it,” he replies, then nods at Hudson. “Right, buddy?”
Hudson offers a hopeful look at Banks, who pats Hudson’s flank as they keep running. Yup. I was right.
“So, safe to say Hudson’s yours now too?”
“Fuck yes,” Banks says, no questions asked. Then he shoots me a serious look. “And what about you?”
I blink, unsure what he means. “Is…Captain my dog?”
Banks nearly stumbles. A rare sight—the man is fast on his feet. But he slows at the street sign, Hudson slowing, too, and turning to look at Banks with doggy concern.
“I was thinking more about whether you were going to get a dog, not whether Chloe’s dog was yours…but way to connect the dots, bro.”
Ah, shit. That was a Freudian slip. “Sorry. Morning brain,” I mumble, trying to cover it up, stat.
He scoffs—or maybe it’s a laugh. Probably both. “Or…wishful thinking?”
But those are things I can’t want. Can’t wish for. I wave a hand. “Just got dogs on my mind.”
“Yeah, you should adopt one. But more to the point—are you and Chloe a thing now?”
No. That can’t happen. I won’t date a co-worker. That’s asking for trouble. But even if I was okay with it, there’d be that wholelove never works outthing. “No. I’m not dating her or anyone. Love sucks, and then it chews you up and spits you out,” I say.
“Not always,” he says, and sure, easy for him to say. He didn’t almost get married to someone who cheated on him. But I’m notgoing to compare heartbreak. Especially with a man who’s very happily attached.
“Most of the time,” I say, then swallow my pride—and man, does it taste bitter going down. But I better own up to whatthe thingwith Chloe really is. “Anyway, I said that because…I have to do this whole…thingwith her.”
“Thing? What thing?” he asks, still seeming a little lost. Understandable, since I’ve done a terrible job explaining I’m now crooning the finale in her mom’s show. My chest tightens, and I bristle a little inside. But the whole town’s going to know soon anyway. Might as well get it out with a friend first. “Perform a song,” I manage to say, “at a fundraiser.”
Banks shoots me awhat the fucklook. Yep, this is why I’ve kept my hobby to myself. Because it doesn’t fit the image I’ve carefully cultivated. The image I needed when I ran the firm with my dad. The way he taught me to behave in business. When being a professionalprofessional—I fight off a smile as I think of Chloe’s words—was my job.
“It’s nothing,” I add quickly, then tug at my T-shirt. It feels too tight. Too hot. Or maybe it’s the knot of tension in my chest growing tighter.
“That’s not nothing. I just had…no idea,” he says.
“Her mom needed help, so she asked me, and I said yes,” I say, making it seem like no big deal that I’m performing a number in front of the whole town. And yes, I leave out the part about the soft blackmail. The karaoke. The wholeSam Silversmiththing. How am I going to tell him that?
“So you can sing?”
I shrug as we run. My version of an admission.
He’s quiet for a few houses as we jog past a row of Craftsman homes, then he says, “I can do origami.”
I shoot him a curious look. “You…can?”
