I shifted my gaze to Ruby, who made a show of stretching, leaning to the side, hands on hips. “Well, I’m running,” she said. “Preparing to run. Thinking about running.” She laughed to herself, and I heard Mac’s laugh in echo.
“If you wait a minute, I’ll catch up with you,” I said. Even though it was too hot and I was nursing a hangover. Ruby, on the other hand, seemed fully recovered.
“Oh, no,” she said, “I’d better embarrass myself on my own. Enjoy the peace and quiet, Harper!” And then she took off, slowly but confidently. I watched her in the rearview mirror until she disappeared down the road. Mac was watching, too.
“What did she want?” I asked.
“To say hey, I guess.” He scratched at the side of his face, in need of a shave. “I thought it would be worse if I ignored her. You know how she is. Persistent.”
Didn’t we both. “Hey?” I said, arm hanging out the window, practically searing against the hot metal in the sun. “That’s all?”
“Harper, come on,” he said, glancing to the side quickly before approaching my window. He bent down, tan arm resting beside mine on the window frame, his free hand tucking the hair behind my ear. “You’re the one who kicked me out the other night.”
I brushed his hand away. “Mac, seriously, what did she say to you?” I said. With Mac, I had learned to ask things directly, knowing he would be direct in response.
“I think she said, Hey, Mac, long time. How’s it been?” He smiled, the corners of his eyes crinkling. I rolled my eyes, and he squeezed my arm. “Be fair, Harper. I’d think by now you’d do me the favor of at least acting like you trust me.”
And that right there was the reason I had stayed in this casual limbo, even though neither of us seemed interested in taking it any further. I did trust him, in a simple, straightforward way, and there was something to appreciate in that. He didn’t hide who he was or what he was interested in. I wouldn’t wake one day to find him halfway out the door with half my furniture in tow. It was the easy path. The simple path. The one that required no commitment and no promises.
He tapped the car door once as he stood. “Although,” he said, “she also wanted to know where you were. She asked if I’d seen you. Maybe she knows. Maybe it’s fine.” He lifted one shoulder in a slow shrug, half his mouth in a careless grin.
My eyes widened. Ruby had my number. She could’ve called if she’d really wanted to know. I hardened my gaze. Made sure he knew I was serious. That this was serious. “Mac, it never happened,” I said.
His expression shifted—confusion and something else. Resignation. Acceptance. He nodded once. “If you say so,” he said, stepping back, erasing all that had come before. Like we could rewrite history, undo our missteps, go back and take a different path. And it was like we both understood, right then, that it was over.
Our end, as easy as our beginning.
He looked toward the woods. “Better get out of here, then,” he said. “Before she makes it back around and wonders what you’re still doing here.”
* * *
THE NEIGHBORS HAD STARTED emerging again. Whitney, sitting cross-legged on the top porch step, smiling at the phone in her lap; Tina, pushing her dad in his wheelchair with her mother beside her, waving to someone out of my sight. There had been a shift; a return to normal.
People could get used to any change. All we needed was time.
* * *
THERE WAS A PHONE ringing somewhere in the house. Muffled, but with a high-pitched generic ringtone, coming from upstairs.
Ruby’s phone.
I carried my files from work upstairs but went straight to her room first. Her phone sat on the edge of her bed, facedown. I flipped it over before I could talk my way out of it, wondering who might be calling her.
An ID flashed on the screen—BB, a name she had added to her contacts. It took me only a second to work it out: Blair Bowman. It had to be. The lawyer whose name I’d seen on the television screen. The phone stopped ringing, now showing the message 5 Missed Calls.
The phone chimed once in my hand as I was staring at the display. A text this time, from the same caller: We need to talk. Pls call me back ASAP.
Definitely the lawyer, who couldn’t be bothered with the extra milliseconds needed to type out the word please.
A door opened downstairs, footsteps heading across the foyer. I dropped the phone back on her bed, hoped I got the positioning right, and rushed out of her room. I was just passing the top of the stairs, files still in hand, when Ruby started up in her new jogging shoes.