Reagan had cut her off. “Oh, the CDC . . .”
“Sometimes I think you don’t want to get back to normal, Reagan. Sometimes I think you like it better this way.”
Sometimes Reagan agreed with her.
But Reagan had made the drive out to Arnold, anyway. She’d even come a day early to carry the folding chairs up from Grandpa’s basement and to wash all the not-quite-china. And here she was, sitting at a table crowded with family—and even more crowded with food. （She’d claimed a chair at the grown-ups’ table without consulting anyone. Her thirty-eight-year-old brother was at one of the kids’ tables, and Reagan didn’t feel a tiny bit bad about it.） She was sitting between her mom and her aunt, facing the window that looked out on the house next door. Reagan had spent the last twenty-four hours not looking in that direction, but now she was stuck.
The neighbors had a full house today, too; the street outside was bumper-to-bumper trucks and SUVs. The two houses were set so close that Reagan could see right into the neighbor’s dining room. She could see people sitting at the table . . .
She could see Mason staring right at her.
Reagan froze.
He was smiling at her. His gentle little chipmunk smile. He slowly raised a hand and moved his fingers to wave. Reagan nodded, but she wasn’t sure he’d see it, so she raised her hand, too, then quickly put it back under the table.
“Who are you waving at?” her mom asked.
“One of the kids next door.”
“We should close those curtains.” Her mom flagged down one of the great-grandkids who was walking by the window. “Grace, close those curtains.”
“Leave them open,” Reagan’s grandpa said. “This isn’t a funeral.”
“Dad, the McCrackens are watching us eat.”
“They aren’t watching us eat. They’ve got satellite TV over there. They’ve got better things to do.”
Reagan avoided the window for the rest of the meal. The few times she glanced up, Mason was sitting there, probably talking to someone; it was hard to tell. Then she glanced up again, and someone else was sitting there. She relaxed a little after that.
After dinner, she helped her mom and her aunts clear the table. Reagan picked up the glass lasagna pan of Jell-O salad that she’d brought. It was still half-full. She grabbed two wet spoons out of the dish drainer and headed out the back door. “Be right back.”
He was standing on his deck, leaning on the railing, looking out into the field. She’d known she’d find him out here . . .
No, that wasn’t quite true. She’d just hoped that she would.
Mason turned when he heard her door open. He smiled a little. “Hey.”
“Hey,” Reagan said. “Who’re you hiding from this time?”
“I’m not hiding,” he said.
It was still full daylight. Winter daylight—bright yellow shot with gray. Mason was wearing a red sweater with Rudolph on the front. His face was flushed. It wasn’t cold enough for a heavy coat—there wasn’t any snow on the ground—but he had on a faded denim jacket with a flannel collar. His hair was cut short over his neck and ears. That must have been Covid hair, last year. This was what he really looked like.
Reagan held out the pan of Jell-O salad.
He lowered an eyebrow.
“I’ve got spoons,” she said.
Mason laughed and sat down on the edge of his deck, hopping off.
He came around the side of her grandpa’s deck, taking the steps. Reagan prepared herself for it. She still wasn’t good in these moments, when someone was approaching her.
She saw the top of Mason’s head on the stairs. And then the rest of him. She could see his body more clearly than she had last year. He had broad shoulders and a barrel chest. Thick arms. A belly. He looked young. The way country boys look young. Even this side of thirty.
When he got to the deck, Reagan took a step back. He stepped back, too, to the edge of the stairs.
She kind of shrugged the pan at him. Like she wasn’t sure what to do next. There weren’t any chairs out here, and she was already losing her nerve.
“I have a mask,” Mason said, reaching into his pocket.
“It’s okay,” Reagan said. “We’re outdoors. And . . . it’s okay.”
“Here . . .” Mason backed down a few steps and sat, leaving room for Reagan at the top. “Yeah?”
“Yeah,” she said, sitting. She stuck a spoon in the pan and passed it down to him.
He took it. “Is that what I think it is?”