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"Nathan."
"Right."
He was taller than the others, stocky. The first time he'd been here he'd walked in with a stocking cap. Dance had started to say something, when Donnie noticed and, eyes wide, said, "Dude? Seriously? Respect."
"Oh, sorry." The hat had vanished and he'd never worn it again.
The boys were playing that game they'd made up themselves. The name was, she believed, Defend and Respond Expedition Service, or something close to that. She supposed there was some shoot-'em side to the game but that didn't bother her. Since it was played with paper and pen, a variation of a board game, she didn't mind a little military action. Dance kept her eye on video games and movies. TV shows now too. Cable opened the door to anything-goes. Wes asked if he and Donnie could watch Breaking Bad. Dance screened it first and loved the show but after the acid-dissolved body fell through a ceiling, she'd decided: No. Not for a few years.
But a game you played with paper and pen? How harmful could that be?
"You boys want to stay for dinner? Call your parents?"
Donnie said, "Thanks, Mrs. Dance, but I have to go home."
"Yeah, me too," Nathan said. Looking embarrassed and guilty at the same time--the essential expressions of adolescence.
"Start packing up. We're going to eat soon."
"Okay," Donnie said.
She looked at her son and, when she spoke, she quashed "honey," given that his peers were present. "Wes, Jon and I were talking. You ever see Rashiv anymore?"
Silence for a moment. "Rashiv?"
"He was nice. I haven't seen him for a while."
"I don't know. He's kind of... He's got a different bunch he hangs with."
Dance thought this was too bad. The Indian American, as Jon Boling had observed, was funny and smart and polite. Which meant not only was he good company, but he was a good influence too. Her son was getting to the point where, in the middle school he attended, there would be increasing temptations to steer toward the dark side.
"Well, if you see him, say hi for me."
"Sure."
After Wes's friends left, Dance herded Maggie from the den and the two ladies prepared dinner. Whole Foods had been instrumental--sushi, a roasted chicken, mashed potatoes, green beans and a complicated salad, which included cranberries, some kind of mystery seeds, bits of cheese and impressive croutons.
Boling set the table.
As she watched him her thoughts segued to the two of them, Dance and Boling.
The hours he spent with her and the children were pure comfort. The times she and he got away alone for a rare night at an inn were so very fine too. (He never stayed the night when the children were here.) All was good.
But Kathryn Dance wasn't long a widow. She monitored the pulse of her figurative heart, on the lookout for subconscious blips that might sabotage the relationship--the first since Bill's death. She was not going to make fast decisions, for her own peace of mind, and for the children: They were the North Star she and Boling navigated their relationship according to. And it was Dance's job to be in control. To keep the speed brakes on.
Then her hand paused as it scooped potatoes from carton to bowl. And she asked herself: Or is there another reason I'm keeping the relationship with Jon Boling in low gear?
He looked up from the table and caught her eye. He smiled. She sent one his way too.
"Dinner's ready!" she called.
Wes joined them, pulling a juice from the fri
dge.
"Put the phone away. No texting."
"Mom, just--"
