Page 31 of Lost and Found

“Ah,” he says. “Given that we are friends who have previously—kissed?”

Kissed?Forbidden crushes and a million tangled stares across the same town, one magical, hazy, seemingly endless night full of a bit more than kissing, which turned into carefully distant longing with a side helping of shame, that only settled back into some mild (if slightly antagonistic) flirting and a sort-of friendship after years? But okay. Sure.

“Friends who kissed” is fine, too.

I’m certainly not going to claim it meant more if it didn’t to him.

“Maybe it was a little more than that,” he adds. “Friends who’ve done some stuff and . . . kinda-sorta seen each other naked.”

“Silas.” I wince, but the food and beer have loosened me up, and it trips right into a weak chuckle.

“What? It was dark. I hardly remember the nipple rings. Definitely never thought about them again.”

I sigh tiredly but my ears are ablaze. “Well, I don’t have those anymore.”

“See? All that not-remembering I did didn’t matter, anyway.”

I give him a considering look. He cocks his head to match my angle and smirks, but this one isn’t smug. It’s a kind, patient curve.See, we’re adults and we can laugh about this, it says.We can be friends even if I know what you taste like. Even if you know how demanding I get and the way my grip gets deliciously rough.

“How about this? We lay out a bunch of rules to help you feel better, because I know you like your lists,” he says, the breeze playing with a lock of his hair.

“How do you know I like lists?”

“Every box you brought to my house has an itemized list of everything inside it taped to the top in the exact same spot, you lit up at the idea of doing Merritt’s list, and . . .” He scratches the back of his neck stiffly. “And you’re just generally very organized and efficient?”

Merritt used to lovingly call it things likemilitant,anal,relentless. Aworker bee, thenBumblebee, she called me, which got abbreviated toBBlater. Because I do love my lists and tasks and figuring out how to accomplish things best.

But for as well as he’s read me, I now see Silas a little more clearly, too. I think of the way his truck is always tidy and how clean his house is. I get the briefest flashback of a made bed before I shut that memory down. The punctuation in his texts and his rapid-fire mouth. Observant and sharp andefficienthimself. Like recognizing like.

There’s control in his chaos. A predictability to it.

“Okay,” I say.

He clears his throat and leans over the table, a different sort of smile drifting up his face. Not something full of hidden messages or anything meant to charm or coax. It’s a naked smile, boyish and sweet.

“All right. Now that that’s settled. Let’s get into some rules.”

Most of the rules we discuss are basic and straightforward. Generally picking up after ourselves, respecting each other’s food. Not walking around naked—though Silas gallantly states that if this is how I am most comfortable, he will allow it.

When I ask him to give me a heads-up if he is bringing someone home, his jaw goes taut before he blows out a long sigh and says, “I’m not in the headspace for any of that right now, but . . . sure, I’ll let you know if that changes.”

“You don’t need to be ready for a relationship to want to bring someone home,” I remind him.

He polishes off his beer, something hardening in his expression. “True. And I’m not in the headspace for any of it. Not a relationship or a situationship or a fuckbuddy or whatever it is that people are calling it currently.”

“A one-night stand?” I offer, patently ignoring the way my belly dips at the wordfuckbuddy.

He levels a measured look at me and lets the moment stretch. Brings his hands into his lap. “I’m no good for any of it right now, Bea.”

Again, this brand of blatant self-deprecation doesn’t quite go with the picture of him that I’ve had built up. I vow to myself not to make any more assumptions. “For the record,” I tell him, “neither am I.” The sun has fully set by now, and I fix my eyes on the moon reflecting off the ocean in the distance. Like the thumbnail of some god reaching out from the depths. “I can’t chance it right now. Not when I know I want to bring a kid into my life. It wouldn’t be fair to expect someone to sign up for a relationship where they’d automatically default to number two right away. Plus, I think, in order to prioritize a baby . . . I think I have to prioritize myself for a little bit first.”

Before Mom married Kurt, for the first five years of my life, my biological father wandered in and out of it. I think I was too young to be too confused, but I do remember the way it hurt my mom every time it inevitably fell apart. Thankfully, at age six, I caused some sort of plumbing-related disaster with a few toys and a ball of Play-Doh, and Kurt was who showed up to do repairs.

Still, I wouldn’t want to stretch myself thin like Mom had in those earlier years, trying to accommodate a relationship for my child’s sake. It’d be better not to count on someone at all, I think.

Silas sits up straighter in his seat and watches me in that laxly concentrated way of his. “So let’s write outyourlist, then,” hesays. “I know you want to do the stuff in Merritt’s letter. But what about adding your own spin on things?”

I study him for a few long, steady seconds, while his eyes dance between mine and my mouth. “Okay,” I agree. “But I want you to add something, too. For you. Something I can do with you.”