“…in bed,” Ari adds, a step behind him. “Do you do that with fortune cookies? Add ‘in bed’ to the end of the fortunes and they somehow make more sense?”
He shakes his head. “Those cookies are always stale and flavorless.”
His cookie standards must be as impossible to meet as his dating standards.
Though the trees are bare, they create an effective barrier from the cacophony that reminds her of New Year’s Eves past.
Ari feels a jolt of panic as her stiletto slips down the pavement, now slick with a thin coat of frost.
“Josh!” she shouts, barely catching her balance. “I can’t get down the hill in these shoes.”
He turns around, sizing up her predicament. “The ‘hill’? You mean this gentle slope that’s graded for wheelchair access?”
“Spoken like someone who’s never worn heels. Just give me your hand or something.”
Josh lets out a deep sigh, as if this is the biggest possible chore.
Ari grabs his hand, takes a tiny test step, and slips again. “Shit.” She looks up. “I’ll have to live here.”
With a shake of his head, Josh bends down, places his shoulder at her hip, and lifts her off the ground in one fluid motion.
“The hell?” she yelps, smacking him on the back, trapped in some kind of humiliating fireman carry.
“First, I don’t trust you not to take me down with you,” he says, heading down the slope. “Second, there’s finally a point to all the lumberjack presses and triceps dips I’ve been doing at the gym: lifting shopping baskets and women in non-functional shoes.”
“Hey!” she mutters. “Be careful where you put your hand, I can feel everything through this coat.”
“Watch your head.” He ducks down, passing through the arch to the other side. She can faintly catch the scent of his hair product.
“It’s not my head I’m worried about.”
“I’ll let you carry me on the way back.” He takes his damn time setting her back on her feet, with a grunt of effort. She tries to readjust her dress beneath her coat. There’s a good chance her breasts escaped their insubstantial constraints. “This spot is off the race route,” he says. “There’s a boarded-up cave somewhere around here.”
Ordinarily, Ari would be scrambling down the rocks to check out the cave, but at the moment, she has a more pressing need.
“Mind if I smoke this?” She retrieves a joint from her little clutch. It seemed classier than a vape pen.
He shakes his head and brushes some microscopic dirt off a large boulder before taking a seat.
“I kind of felt a”—she makes a jittery hand gesture—“thingcoming on at the party.”
“I noticed.”
Ari flicks her lighter and slowly creates a cherry, rolling the joint between her fingers over the flame, pausing to take a small drag. She probably should do some deep breathing that doesn’t involve smoke inhalation, but when has that ever worked in a crisis?
She takes a long hit before offering it to him.
His gears turn for a few seconds, but she’s pleasantly surprised when he reaches for the joint. Ari leans against the cold rock wall of the arch, watching him draw the smoke in.
“It’s bad for your palate,” he says, “but who fucking cares now? It’s not like I’m at risk of oversalting someone’s duck confit.”
There’s a retort on the tip of her tongue, but who is she to lecture anyone about giving up?
“Your mom was pretty much running a visual analysis on the childbearing capabilities of my hips.”
“It’s hardwired in her amygdala.” He carefully passes the joint back to her and their cold fingers brush for a second. There’s a quick flash in her mind’s eye: Josh’s hand pressing against her lower back twenty minutes ago. Then tangled in her hair, holding it back. Pulling. That part’s not a memory fragment. It’s…something else. Too many cocktails, maybe. “My mother can’t help trying to fix my life.”
“It’s nice. I mean, I can see how that would be comforting—to have someone want that for you.” The contrast between the icy December air and the hot smoke shocks her lungs.
