“You can’t.” The words are flat, not cruel. “Not with her. Not with the baby. Not with me. You don’t get to slide out the back when it gets too hard.”
“I know.” The shame is a hot, stupid thing at the base of my neck. “I didn’t— I wasn’t… going far,” I finish stupidly.
He nods without looking at me. “Good. Now do better.”
There’s a weird comfort in how simple he makes it. Not easy. Simple. Don’t run. Do better.
“I will,” I say. I mean it. Saying it out loud sets it in stone.
“Good,” he says and reaches for the handle. “Now, go home and forget those assholes.”
The dome light snaps on again, and he slides out.
“And Ben?” he adds, hand on the door.
“Yeah?”
“If those guys come back into the Pint, you let me know,” he says. “Not because I’m going to swing. Because I’ve got questions of my own about anybody who thinks they get to decide who a damn Richards chooses to spend their time with.”
“I’ll show you the security footage if you want,” I say.
“Do that,” he says. He closes the door and taps the roof twice before walking to his car, a couple of spaces away.
Jason’s taillights wash the lot red, then slip into the street. I sit with the engine ticking, hands on the wheel, and remember that night.
Eighteen. First break home. The walkway outside the condo is littered with my clothes. I’m on the curb, elbows on my knees, breath coming in short, sharp pulls that rip through my chest. The key that didn’t turn is still in my fist.
Tires crunch back over the gravel. Jason swings in because I left something in his car—physics notes, a charger, I don’t even remember. He kills the engine, steps out, and takes it in: the scattered clothes, me folded small. He doesn’t ask what happened. He doesn’t say anything at all. He just lowers himself beside me on the curb and stays.
He breathes slowly, and I try to match it. When the jagged edge finally dulls and the world stops tilting, he stands. We move together down the walkway, picking up everything I dropped. He shakes out a shirt, hands it to me, tucks socks into the sidepocket, zips the split bag, and slings it over his shoulder like it weighs nothing.
He opens the passenger door of his car. “Come on,” is all he says. I get in. He drives me to his house for the rest of the trip. No speeches. No questions. Just takes me home.
The porch light’s out when I pull in, but the moon’s doing enough work that I can see the little table between the chairs. There’s a paper bag sitting on it, folded twice at the top, the Sweet Confessions logo stamped on the side. One greasy circle has bled through near the bottom, faint as a thumbprint.
Guilt hits like a body blow. I was supposed to be there. I was supposed to sit with her and talk through menus and plug-in times, and whether lemon goes better with malt or rye. Instead, she left me peace offerings that I didn’t earn.
I carry the bag inside and set it on my counter like it’s a note she wrote and I’m saving it like some love-sick teenager.
The kitchen clock says it’s late—too late for someone who wakes up before the sun and bakes in the early hours. I shouldn’t call. I told her I’d see her first thing. I told Jason I’d show up.
I last about ninety seconds.
Keys. Wallet. I’m back out the door.
The road between my place and the Richards’ is muscle memory. I could drive it blind. The night is big and soft in the way summer nights are out by the river.
Somewhere, cicadas are building a wall of sound. The houses on their street are mostly dark—porches empty, curtains pulled, the world is quiet in the hours between late and early.
I cut the engine at the curb and watch the house for a minute. Every window is dark. The kitchen. The living room. The lamp they leave on outside if someone’s out late—off.
I close the truck door with two fingers and a prayer that it doesn’t echo. The gravel in the driveway sounds loud enough to wake the county. I stick to the grass, to the side yard, to the shadow line where the maple throws a darker patch over the world.
The back of the house faces the river—wide porch, a deeper deck off the second floor that’s been there since Jason and I were kids climbing where we shouldn’t. Paige’s window is above and to the right.
I shouldn’t be doing this. Grown men do not climb trees to knock on bedroom windows. Teenagers do this in movies and get caught by dads with shotguns. I put a hand on the bark anyway.
The trunk is wide and easy, the first branch low enough that even a tired body can swing up. I pull, plant a foot, move again. The old creak of wood at night sounds far too loud.
