That noise again—Alex was awake, probably. I was looking forward to seeing him, I realized. I hadn’t seen Alex in a couple of days—not the real Alex. Video Alex, I’d seen plenty.
I opened the fridge. I had been humming, only realizing when I stopped.
The fridge was full. Offood. Alex took most of his meals at the bar, by necessity. He spent most of his waking hours there.
But in the crisper drawer, there were green,leafythings, and on the top shelf, gut-health yogurt. A tin of artisanal tea sat on the counter.
A dog barked, somewhere close. I closed the fridge and peered into the backyard again. That’s what I’d been hearing, the quiet, questioningwuffof a dog on alert for trouble.
Another bark, in-the-house close. In whatuniversewould Alex have a dog in the house?
Now there was another bark, sharper, joining in, a chorus, aduet. And not just any two dogs.
Maybe Oona had needed someone to take Bear and Lemondrop overnight? Of course I would have watched them if she was going to stay out again, but I hadn’t been to the apartment since I’d left for Heather’s. Yesterday.
I picked up the tin of tea.
We were coffee people. It was a small thing, but why would Alex have a teakettle? He wouldn’t even know where to look for artisanal tea. Or leafy greenanything.
He was shuffling around in his room now, soft sounds beneath the dogs flipping out to be let free.
I heard the click of a door, and then Bear and Lemon galloped out to check out the intruder, yowling, nails scraping the hardwood floors. They slid around the corner and into the kitchen at full tilt, updating from attack mode to level-eight full-body wiggles. I knelt on the floor and gave them the scritches they deserved, telling them they were such good security doggies while I waited for Alex to emerge.
But the footsteps in the hall weren’t right. They were light, with a distinctive sound to them I could almost place. Muffled, soft, two dust mops approaching. I had just begun to wonder if Alex had turned the house into a rental without letting me know,justbegun to understand that someone other than Alex would be coming around the corner, when I realized who it would be.
I stood, letting the dogs lap at my fingers for treats I wasn’t carrying.
Oona appeared in her bunny slippers, sleepy-eyed and hair spiked up in that pillow-smashed way. She wore a man’s robe, but this time it was Alex’s.
“Good morning?” she said. A question.
But I had a lot more questions than that.
34
“He’s getting dressed,” Oona said, as I opened my mouth to ask—
What? What had I meant to ask?
Was Alex home? Was I misunderstanding something?
But I was not. I understood perfectly, and Oona was answering the big-money question as directly as she could, before I made a fool of myself trying to justify why she and the dogs had slept at the house. In Alex’s bedroom.
“Oh my God,” I said.
“This isn’t how we wanted to tell you,” Oona said.
“Tellme,” I repeated, uneasily. The totality of what might need to be explained opened up considerably.We?“Tell me what, exactly?”
“Well,” she said. Like an apology.
“It’s not a one-night thing,” I said.
“Let’s wait for Alex,” she said.
“Oh my—” I caught sight of the teakettle again, and the tea. There was a calendar on the wall I didn’t recognize, and—total red flag—it was on the correct month.
Then I remembered how awkward Alex had been lately. More awkward thannormal. And distracted. The unopened mail at the bar.Closing McPhee’s unexpectedly and showing up anyway. That chance meeting with Oona on the street caught by the security cameras, that meet-cute I’d read as a sort of parent-teacher conference, not by chance at all. And I’d assumed they’d be talking aboutme. The many walks I’d taken the dogs for since I moved in, when Oona was out late. Staying with friends. Dinner with a visiting cousin.
