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“I gathered.”
Something glitters in his eyes, like he finds amusement in this. “Jordy is here,” he says.
His brother. I let out a light chuckle. “Is he giving you a hard time?”
Lyle steps forward, lifts on his toes, and cups a hand to my ear. “He came to apologise.”
He rocks back from me with a delighted smile, and I grin too. “Definitely don’t want to disturb that.”
“Yeah. It’s hard enough for him to admit he’s wrong already.”
“Get back in there, then.”
Lyle starts to walk back, but pauses as his shoulder brushes past my arm. “He told me you helped him when I was in Europe.”
“I promised him I wouldn’t say anything.”
“Well . . . I mean, he’s told me himself now. Some of it anyway. I’d like to hear your side.”
“I was finishing a job near the park and I recognised him on my way to the truck. His friends had gone on without him and he wasn’t in a good state so I brought him to your place. I used the key in the lockbox, hope that’s okay.”
Lyle nods. “He said you made him text Mum that he was okay, and helped with his hangover the next day.”
“Pickles for breakfast.”
“He hates pickles.”
“He won’t be rushing to get smashed again then.”
“Did he really throw up on you?”
“That jacket needed a wash anyway.”
Hazel eyes glance sideways to meet mine. “Thank you.”
I wave it off and he walks away, calling over his shoulder. “Bring those beers back tomorrow.”
So I do. Then again the week after. Then we shake things up and go out—an epic food crawl in preparation for which we starve ourselves for the whole day. Spicy tacos and sizzling kebabs and the best Korean fried chicken in the city. A flute of bubbly over a shared bowl of decadent chocolate mousse. By that time I’m feeling a little woozy so I push the bowl towards him. “All yours.”
“Here I thought we were embarking on bromance. Turns out you want to torture me.” Lyle sips his bubbly and leans forward. “Better idea. We’ll ask one another questions, and the first who doesn’t answer has to finish the mousse.”
I raise a brow.
He grins. “Prepare to explode.”
“I’ll ask first, then.” I hum. “Your biggest pet peeve about me?”
“Why? Will you try and change it?”
“Would that help me pass the performance review?”
Lyle folds his arms, leaning back comfortably in his seat. He scrolls his eyes up and down me. “Not sure I know you well enough to tell you your worst traits.”
I shake my head at him. “That’s . . . frank.”
“You like that.”
I narrow my eyes.
He laughs and leans in. “Jealousy. Gosh you got riled up, competing with me.”
I lean in too, eye to eye, a standoff. “You like that too.”
He sucks in a breath and sinks further into his chair, breaking eye contact. “What was it about Robin, for you?”
“Too soon.”
He pushes the bowl towards me.
I stop it. “His warmth, the gentle way he is around animals, how easy it is to be around him. He felt like a home.”
“Is that what you want?”
“I’m approaching thirty and move to a new rental nearly every year. I’m constantly designing and tending gardens I never see mature. Settling down with a good guy, having a family, feeling like we’re a home. That’s what I want.”
Lyle takes the bowl and sets it in the middle of the table. He stares at the glass. “I asked two questions. You can too.”
I rub my hands together. “How long do I have before the performance review?”
A snickery laugh. Lyle twists the base of the bowl. “I’ll let you know before Christmas. I won’t start the new year with you if . . .”
I fail, got it. I laugh light-heartedly. “You’ll regret it if you abandon me.”
He shakes his head adamantly.
I clutch my chest. It seems exaggerated, and it is. Yet, my stomach twists. “Is there anything you regret?”
“Eating this much?”
“Real things, I mean. Important things.”
Lyle’s small smirk fades. He laughs hollowly, picks up his spoon and eats the last of the mousse.
Sometimes it’s mundane stuff like the groceries, sometimes I drag Lyle to the gardens and give him lessons on plants, sometimes he trounces me playing video games, sometimes we head to a movie after work, but it’s every week. We just do stuff together.
I’m fairly sure he’ll keep me, even if we have had a few disagreements. Mostly around tardiness. Lyle is scrupulous with his time-management; he’s rarely late anywhere. I, on the other hand, have a more relaxed relationship with time. I’m a good friend of the fashionable fifteen-minute rule. Sometimes it’s more like twenty, though. Thirty, a couple of times.
“Sorry,” I say, careening into the café and plonking myself on the chair across from him. “I was transplanting.”
“At Robin’s?”
“He goes surfing this time on Saturdays.”
Lyle frowns into his half-finished cup of coffee. “I should head home. Cleaning.”
