Page 171 of The New Place

“And I’m really just so happy for you guys.” Steve grins. “Happier if you buy my place.”

He’s mostly joking, Ned is sure. He’ll be fine if they don’t buy it, and bumping into him at a conference in the future will be nothing but the joy of catching up with an old friend.

We’re not going to, Ned needs to tell him, so Steve and Jess can list the house and find a buyer who can afford the place, so they can move on with their lives.

“We’re talking about it still,” Ned says instead.

“Well, let me know what you figure out.” Steve lifts his mug in a toast and backs toward the door. “And congrats again.”

“Thanks,” Ned manages and stands there, unable to shake the thought that he’ll keep running and running in this life, and never keep up with Abbot. He won’t even come close.

When he’d been a doctoral candidate, the difference between them hadn’t seemed insurmountable, but now, being a professor? He’s face to face with how far apart their lives are. Their careers, their paths to get here, and certainly where their futures are going. Together at Newbury, yes, but Ned will always be second fiddle to Abbot, always the one helped along by a spousal hire, always trailing him.

Maybe that doesn’t matter now, when Ned’s working through the very early stages of his career, but in a couple years? When it takes him ages to earn promotions that are handed to Abbot? When he struggles for funding, and has to scrape by on smaller grants? Always ends up at smaller conferences, and even then he’s giving a talk in a side room during a morning session, when Abbot has the entire main auditorium packed?

Ned’s a weight to be dragged around. And not just professionally. He can’t even live with his husband. Can’t visit his family, either.

If Ned had more time—would it matter, though? Has he been thinking about this all wrong? Will he always be a step behind? Slow to get his life in gear, unable to catch up? That’s not a partnership. That’s Abbot tugging Ned along, while Ned barely has his feet under him.

Do they want a life like that?

He clutches his coffee, his ring glinting where he’s gripping the handle too tight.

The distractions of the workday don’t help, and when the building empties, Ned stays at his desk as winter’s early evening darkens the windows and the room around him.

He startles at a knock and gathers himself as best he can, drawing his focus back from the blank computer screen he’s been staring at. “Come in,” he calls, steeling himself to focus on listening to whoever it is. A student, probably, and he’ll have to dredge up reassurances. It’ll be another set of questions about transferring to a different college, wanting guidance about what they should do, and they’ll look to Ned like he has all the answers, hope plain on their faces that he’ll manage to fix the mess they’re in.

Yeah, well. Good luck to them all, if Ned’s the one dispensing advice.

But Dad stands in the doorway, looking around the small room. Dan, the name on his shirt reads in red embroidered letters, oil stains on the cloth and the faint scent of diesel that always follows him when he leaves the shop.

Ned half stands. “Is everything okay? Is it Peggy?” Oh shit, was he supposed to pick her up? What time is it even, that Dad’s here? Ned grabs his phone, but there are no notifications. Though it’s late for Peggy to be getting out of school, and Jen has her tonight anyway, so none of that explains Dad here, at Adams.

“Wanted to see the place before you move on and up in the world,” Dad says, running his finger along the books on the shelf, then pulling out the chair in front of Ned’s desk and sitting in it. “I imagine Newbury is all carved mahogany walls and you’ll have one of those fancy leather chairs. And a fireplace in your office too?”

“You just came by?”

“Your mom said you weren’t home yet, so I figured I would.” Dad picks up the framed picture of Peggy on the desk, taken when she was a good few inches shorter, her face rounder, her smile not yet missing teeth. Ned keeps meaning to get a new one, and add a few more. One of him and Abbot, too. They took a couple the other night at their wedding.

Wedding. What a strange word, still. An odd idea to apply to the two of them. Married. Ned’s a husband. Again.

Fucking great. He’s as good at it this time around as he was his first try.

“I’m worried about you,” Dad says in that same, easy tone.

“Me?” Ned laughs. “I’m fine.”

“Yeah?” Dad asks, his voice still light. “Lots of work tonight?”

Ned’s computer has long since cycled through the screensaver and gone to sleep. “Yeah.”

“You’ve seemed off for the last couple days.”

“I’m okay.”

“Wanted to talk to you about something. Mom and I have a bit of money for you.”

“What?” Ned sits up straight. “No.”