Page 184 of The New Place

“Any little idiosyncrasies I should know about?”

“He likes to invite himself onto the furniture.”

“Oh, I love a cuddle bug.” Her phone buzzes again. She reads the message, then tucks the phone into her pocket. Only then does she move toward the door, pausing to grab a duffle bag.

Why? Abbot wonders, but she’s hurrying towards the porch, and when he follows her, he finds a car in the driveway, pulled up behind his.

“Hey! You made it. Good timing,” Claire says, waving.

Abbot looks closer. Isn’t that—“Pat?” he asks.

“Hey hey,” Pat says, climbing out of the driver’s seat. “Has the eagle landed?”

“What?” Abbot asks.

“The eagle is about to,” Claire says and stands on her toes to kiss him. “Hi, babe.”

“What’re you doing here?” Abbot asks. He just saw Pat in Portland before he left, when he’d given this week’s soup delivery to Abbot, with the lament that it’s the last one Abbot will bring.

“Picking up my lady for a surprise weekend away,” Pat says and takes Claire’s bag from her.

“I would’ve given you a ride.” Abbot is confused as he looks between them. “Or the soup⁠—”

“Oh, she knows about it. The surprise is for you,” Pat says. “So I needed my car. And the soup was to throw you off the trail, obviously.”

“What trail?”

“Nothing,” Pat says. “There’s no trail. Or eagle. Or anything. Have a great weekend. We’ll be back on Sunday.”

“What is happening?” Abbot asks, but they both get into Pat’s car, and then he’s backing out of the driveway, leaving Abbot alone on his new front porch.

He stands there a moment before letting himself inside. Only then does he realize that Baxter’s not barking. Worried, he quickly hangs up his coat and calls, “Ned?”

But Ned’s not here either, coming behind the scrabble of paws and panting breath with a smile and a kiss.

“Ned?” he calls up the stairs. Why is the house so still and empty? He and Ned talked just this morning, and specifically arranged to meet at the house now, this afternoon, to begin a weekend of unpacking.

Is he not here? Is Peggy alright? Or Baxter, rushed off to the vet?

—There, the jingle of a collar, from the backyard.

Abbot opens the door from the kitchen onto the small patio. Baxter whines, then rushes over in a flurry of black and white fur. He squirms against Abbot’s legs as Abbot pets him. Confused, Abbot looks up to see Ned standing in the middle of the lawn.

Baxter seems entirely normal—back to normal, really—and Ned does too, except—he’s wearing a dress shirt, neatly tucked into a pair of slacks. Abbot notices that first, because every time he’s seen Ned here at the house, he’s been in a paint-stained T-shirt.

“Ned?”

“You gotta read it,” Ned says. “Baxter, sit.”

But Baxter doesn’t sit, happier to have his ears scratched, and only as he keeps wriggling does Abbot feel something tucked into his collar. A note, he sees as he draws it out. Will you be my dog dad? it says in Ned’s handwriting. Abbot turns it over, looking for an explanation.

“I couldn’t ask Peggy to get involved, because she already thinks we’re married.” Ned’s talking quickly. “Which we are. But if I had it to do again, I’d have asked her to help me ask you if—ah damn, I’m getting this all wrong.”

“All what?”

“If you want to be part of our family?” Ned, seeming to remember himself, quickly kneels. “I’m sorry. I’m nervous, which is absurd, I know, but Abbot?”

“Yes?” He steps past Baxter, who clearly wants to keep being pet, the dog fully unconcerned with Ned now on one knee.