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“I’m breathing.”

“Yes, but not hard.”

Her face brightened. “Hey, you’re right!”

I could hear her heart rate. It remained elevated from the climb but far calmer than it had been the first time we walked together.

“You’ve improved.”

She placed both hands on her hips. “Patty made me jog in sixty-second intervals.”

“Sounds effective.”

“I think it’s abuse.” She smiled, and pride moved through me.

She seemed stronger. More comfortable inside her body. More willing to take up space.

“You look good,” I said.

Her smile shifted. “Good sweaty?”

“Good happy.”

The comment silenced her, then she stepped closer and kissed me beneath the same stars where she had pulled away several weeks earlier.

One Thursday, I arrived at her apartment an hour late because a water heater failed in one of the rental properties. I apologized too much. She insisted it didn’t matter. Then we told the truth.

“I was disappointed,” she admitted during a late call after the water-heater night. “Not angry. Just disappointed.”

“I know.”

“No, you don’t. I told you it was fine.”

“I could hear in your voice that it wasn’t fine,” I said.

She sighed. “I don’t want to become another person demanding something from you.”

“You’re allowed to expect me to keep to the plans we made.”

“What if someone needs you?”

“Then I’ll communicate better. I won’t leave you waiting.”

The lesson went both ways.

When she canceled a different night because of a client who demanded a last-minute change before her deadline, I told her I understood the pressure but didn’t believe the deadline deserved automatic control over her life.

“What was I supposed to do?” she asked. “Tell them no?”

“Yes.”

“They would have been unhappy.”

“They were unhappy anyway.”

“That’s different.”

“It isn’t.”