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It wasn’t a lie. The idea just didn’t appeal to me.

I didn’t want to look at that too closely.

Waylon shook his head. “She’s a doctor, dude. Smart, beautiful. What else you doing?”

Waking up at three o’clock in the morning to clear snow off my best friend’s girlfriend’s car?

“Hey.”

My head shot up at the voice. Larissa was standing on the other side of the counter.

I was hit by a ton of bricks. Completely pummeled by the unexpected sight of her.

“What are you doing here?” I asked.

“Filling delivery orders.” She nodded over her shoulder. “I have one at the grocery store in a bit.” She beamed at me. “What are you doing back there?” she asked, peering over the counter.

“Counting blood pressure pills.”

“Wow. You are a drug dealer.”

I huffed a dry laugh.

Little dimple. Beautiful.

Then we just looked at each other. Or maybe it was me looking at her.

I didn’t know how to act without warning and time to prepare. I could maintain my facade in the places we usually met. My house, her apartment. But I didn’t have that armor at work. I hadn’t practiced it here. And I didn’t know what to think about how much I liked that she’d come here and come in to find me, or how good it was to see her.

“I brought you something,” she said. She put a white paper bag on the counter. “You don’t have to open it now. Unless you want to.”

“I have time,” I said, pulling it in front of me.

The bag had a frame in it wrapped in butcher paper. I worked the tape off and peeled the paper back and sucked in a shocked breath.

It was a paper quilling. Flowers and vines around the name Julia.

Mom’s name.

It was beautiful. It made a lump bolt to my throat. “Thank you,” I breathed, peering at it.

It must have taken her days to do this. Weeks even. It was so intricate.

“I thought you’d want something to help remember her,” she said.

I couldn’t even speak. It wasn’t so much that it was for Mom. It was that she’d taken the time to do this for me when time was something that Larissa never had.

Time for her was money. This was a bill she could have paid. Coins for the laundromat, extra delivery orders so she could close the gap on the credit cards.

Instead she’d done this.

I was so moved, I didn’t know what to say.

I think she could see me struggling. “Here, let me wrap it back up for you,” she said gently.

She took it from my hands.

I had to compose myself.