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“I don’t think anyone does. Not even the writers.”
He laughed. Interpreting her response as an invitation, he lowered his long, thin frame to the floor. To accommodate him, Allison had to shift her legs so they hung over the balcony, and Colin did the same. They sat side by side, barely enough space between their arms to claim they weren’t touching. Their feet swung in a dissonant rhythm.
The traffic light at the end of the block cycled through one, two, three series of colors. Allison watched them dance: green, yellow, red, green, yellow, red. She swayed a little with the rush of her blood, the spin of her mind from the booze. Her eyelids had started to droop, her head heavy as lead. It had been a smart move to take a ride share rather than drive. She had one of those buzzes that felt thick enough to last for days.
Beside her, Colin shook his head. “Why did you bring up the goat?”
“What?”
“The goat. Before. You said no more digging up the past.”
Allison sighed. “I wasn’t thinking about our kiss.” Lie. “It’s just a great story. And perfect for that game. You know how I like to win.”
“Do I?”
Allison did her best to glare at him. It was hard to determine how successful she was when she could barely feel her face. “Stop it.”
“I’m serious.” Colin squared his body so all his attention was honed on her. “How am I supposed to forget the past? What if I… I—”
“You just do.” Allison raised her shoulders and blew out a breath. “Like this. Watch. You change the subject.” Dusting her hands together, she said, “I bet Bo is still thriving.” She’d forgotten until this moment that she’d named the goat Bo.
“That creature had no self-preservation skills. He’s probably wandered onto a highway by now.”
Allison squawked. And, before she could think better of it, she smacked Colin in the arm. It was more solid than she remembered, and her heart hiccupped. His eyes dropped to the exact square of knitted rows she’d touched as if she’d left a mark.
Her pulse throbbed against her wrist. “He managed to secure himself a whole bag of carrots. That seems like excellent self-preservation to me.”
“Not if he ate them all at once.”
With an amused huff, Allison looked away, her eyes following a car as it pulled a U-turn farther up the road. Bickering with Colin felt both strange and comfortingly familiar. It had been their way, even when they’d been at their best. One of their most fun dates had involved arguing over the best candy at the movie theater long enough to miss their showing. (Colin had insisted it was chocolate-covered raisins. But raisins weren’t candy. They were undead grapes.) Allison used to believe that she and Colin challenged each other to be smarter, quicker, better. That was why they’d worked so well. Now she wondered if maybe all the arguing was a sign that they’d been broken from the start.
Mandy’s loud laugh echoed from inside the apartment, cutting through Allison’s musing. She and Colin shot looks over their shoulders, moving in tandem. The group seemed farther than two rooms away.
“Do you ever…” His voice hitched. “Do you ever feel like you don’t quite fit here?”
Allison narrowed her eyes at him. “What are you talking about? You’re Colin Benjamin. You fit everywhere.” It was one of the things she’d always loved most about him, that way he had of settling seamlessly into any situation.
He smiled softly, like he thought she was teasing him. “Seriously though, these past few weeks of grad school have been intense, right?” His eyes traced over her, looking for something in her expression. “At least for me.”
“For me, too.” The slight wobble in his voice made that fact easier to confess.
“And we…” He shook his head, seeming to change direction. “Maybe we could… give each other a break? Not help each other, I know that’s blasphemy,” he said with a smirk. “But maybe we could have a mild truce.”
Thanks to the fruity martinis, filterless Allison struck again. “What the fuck is a mild truce?”
He let out one of those fantastically terrible laughs. “One where we agree we are both awesome and don’t need to outdo each other. There’s no rule that says Frances’s class can’t have two excellent TAs.”
This was a surprise. Colin was rarely so open and direct. The few times when he had been remained some of Allison’s strongest memories. Those small, ephemeral peeks he’d offered into other sides of him, like getting to preview the next book in a series before anyone else.
“I suppose it would be nice to put the energy I’d expend trouncing you elsewhere.” She flashed him what she hoped was a playful grin. Barely the length between the balcony’s bars separated their faces. His breath had a hint of the sweetness from the martinis and that sharp, clean scent of hair gel burned the inside of Allison’s nose.
The height of the balcony wasn’t helping her dizziness, and, as her stomach swooped, she leaned her head a little farther forward. All the martinis in the world were sloshing around in her skull.
“We might even…”
“Yeah?” Colin spoke slow and careful, his usual precision lost. Though she might have been imagining it, it seemed as if he were angling closer to her.
And closer.
