“It’s been, I don’t know, a couple of hours. It’s not like I drove home after almost being caught by the police and suddenly had the muse whispering in my ear.”

“I meant—” He turned away again, tracing the back of a slipper chair with one hand. “Like, what do your parents say?”

Talking about my writing always opened that black hole in my stomach, and talking about my parents and my writing was like turning those spinning blades up to ten. But I’d worked hard on not reacting to those feelings. And this was, after all, Deputy Bobby. I took a deep breath. And then another. I watched him: the way his hand followed the back of the chair, the way he angled his body away from me, the slight hunch to his shoulders. And because I’m so very, very smart, it only took me that long to realize, once again, we weren’t really talking about me.

“Well, they haven’t said anything yet. And I really am going to try to finish that story. But I won’t. I mean, I probably won’t. And my dad will get angry and give me this gruff, manly speech about ‘digging down deep’ and ‘doing the work.’ And my mom will have a panic attack, and once that’s over, she’ll spend six weeks researching every therapist in a hundred miles and start making appointments for me.”

The look on Deputy Bobby’s face was priceless.

“This is why I always tell people it’s a good thing that they forget about me most of the time.” I kept my gaze on his face as I asked, “What about your parents?”

He shook his head, and his hand stilled on the back of the chair. “They’re good people.”

I thought I could hear the clock ticking in the hall. After what might have been a minute, I said, “They must be excited that you and West are going to move back to Portland.”

“I guess.” Deputy Bobby gave a pained laugh. “My mom is. I mean, she loves West. Loves him. My family jokes that she loves him more than she loves me. My dad—who knows? I told you about the apartment thing, right?”

I nodded.

“It’s like that. Actually, that’s good, to be honest. A lot of time, it’s nothing. We don’t say anything. West and I go back to visit, and he’ll say, ‘How long are you going to be here?’ And that’s it. That’s the only thing we’ll hear all weekend. The first time I took West to meet them, West tried so hard. He kept asking questions. He was so polite. And my mom answered all the questions, no matter how hard West tried to get my dad to talk. He thought my dad was mad at him until I told him that’s how it always is.”

When I realized he wasn’t going to say anything else, I said, “That sounds hard.”

“It’s…it is what it is.” He shook his head. “God, if West breaks up with me, they’re going to be furious.”

“West isn’t going to break up with you.”

“It was bad enough in college when I told them I was gay. And they lost their minds when I told them that I wasn’t going to med school and, instead, I was going into law enforcement—and, on top of that, I was moving across the state.” His mouth twisted. “My mom lost her mind. My dad went out to the garage and didn’t come back inside until I left. If West breaks up with me, that’s strike three.”

It was such a strange thing to say that I didn’t know how to respond. The wind batted at the panes in the old windows, swallowing the tick of the clock.

“I just don’t know what to do,” Deputy Bobby burst out. “I don’t know what to say. I don’t know how to—I don’t know how to talk to him about it. My parents never fight. They never disagree. They never talk. But everything I do lately seems to make West angry. More than angry. And I want to say something, I want to talk to him, I want to fix it. It’s my fault. I know I can fix it.” His knuckles blanched as he gripped the back of the chair. “But I open my mouth, and it’s like—remember what you said about razor blades? It’s like that. I can’t think. I can’t talk. I can’t get a single word out of my mouth. I just freeze.” That unhappy laugh boiled up again. “But I’m talking to you, so what’s the matter with me?”

“Nothing’s the matter with you. Talking to me isn’t the same as talking to West. With West, there’s more on the line. That’s a lot of pressure. It can be scary.”

“I do fine with pressure. I’m under pressure all day.”

“I know. I just mean there’s more at stake. He’s so important to you.”

Deputy Bobby shook his head, but his hand relaxed around the back of the chair.

“You could try writing it down,” I said. “I could help you. You could write down everything you want to say to him, and then when you’re ready to talk, you’ve got it right there. You’ll look like a total dingus, but you always look like a total dingus, so West won’t even notice.”

His laugh was sudden and shocked. But it was also real. And for the first time in what felt like an eternity, he flashed that goofy smile at me.

“This is why we’re friends,” I said. “I have all the best ideas.”

“It’s a terrible idea.”

“It’s an amazing idea. I literally solved all your problems in like fifteen seconds.”

“You didn’t solve all my problems. You are like eighty percent of my problems.”

“Only eighty? I need to try harder.”

I got that goofy grin again.

“Well?” I asked.

It felt like a long time before he said, “Maybe.” And then, more quietly, “Thank you.”

“How about we make a deal?”

“Dash, I can’t eat an entire birthday cake by myself. I definitely don’t want to eat one by myself.”

“No, that was a challenge, and only because Keme—it doesn’t matter. How about this? I’ll finish my story. Even though it’s going to mean pulling my hair out, and ripping out my fingernails, and screaming into the void as I face my total lack of talent—”

“You’ve been spending too much time with Fox.”

“—and you write down what you want to say to West and have a conversation with him. Explain what’s going on. He loves you. You love him. You need to work this out. Plus it makes me super sad when you’re sad. And I don’t want to be sad. I want to be happy. And full of cake. Like, an entire cake, even though Keme doesn’t think I could do it.”

He came across the room to where I sat on the chaise, and he looked down at me. The dark bronze of his eyes looked even darker than usual because his pupils were swollen, and the angle, with me staring up at him, made it hard to read his expression. He was close enough I could feel him again, that awareness of his body like a sixth sense making the hairs on my arms stand up.

“I’m sorry,” he said. It was like a spell breaking. I was suddenly aware of my flushed cheeks, the heat under my breastbone, the tingling hollowness of my legs. “About earlier.”

I stared at him, unable to bring out any words.

“Damian,” he said.

“Oh.”

“You were right. I was out of line.”

I shook my head because I didn’t trust my voice.

He crouched. He put his hands on my knees. To steady himself, maybe. Or maybe not. They felt like anchors, and the rest of me was trying to float away. He looked me in the eye and said, “You are a good friend. I want you to be happy too.”

I listened to the rhythm of our breaths. Felt the warm weight of his hands. For an instant, he seemed to have his own gravity, and I felt myself tumbling toward him, tipping into him.

And then he adjusted his weight, moving back a fraction, steadying himself, a hint of a self-conscious smile, like a boy wobbling while he tried to do a trick. And it was over.

Chapter 9

Big surprise: I didn’t sleep at all.

I should have been exhausted. I was exhausted. Emotionally, intellectually, physically. After making sure Deputy Bobby was settled, I went to my room and collapsed.