She turns to me, eyes narrow. “Alright, this new neighbor,” she says. “What kind of rich is he? Old rich? Foreign rich? Some developer who’d tear down a gorgeous eight-million-dollar estate just to throw up a cheap subdivision?”
I grip her arms and lock eyes with her, mostly to shut her up. “Amber.” I pause. “Do you remember when we went to Strip Tease for your birthday?”
Her eyes light up. “Yes. Can we go back? We almost never get to do anything fun together.”
I cock my head back, affronted. “We have fun.”
“If you have to say that with your eyebrows touching, we don’t have enough fun.”
Ugh,she’s not wrong. We really don’t go out together much.Shedoes—she goes out with her new friends and coworkers. Amber actually has a social life. If I’m not workingat the university, I’m at home. Amber lives with us, so she'll babysit anytime I ask, but I try not to ask often. She uprooted her whole life in Nashville and moved here on a whim just to support me, so I don’t ask for anything extra.
Amber’s the fun-loving aunt, the extroverted sister. I’m the stick-in-the-mud and the voice of reason. I’m the one organizing the chaos into some kind of predictable structure so I can give my girls the best shot at a bright future. Their abusive father dying? That was the first real, terrifying step in that direction.
She runs her thumb over the crease in my brow. “There you go,” she says. “So... are we going back to Strip Tease? I could go for a hair blowout and a lap dance right about now.”
I shake my head. “Our neighbor. It’s Jonah.”
The words hang between us as she tries to connect the dots.
“Jonah Arc?”
“What?”
“No, wait. It’s Joan of Arc.”
“What are you talking about?”
“The guy in the Bible who built the ark.”
“Noah?”
“I’m pretty sure his name was Joan... or Jonah. I don’t know; I didn’t pay attention in Sunday school, okay? You got me.”
“Amber, listen to me. When we were at Strip Tease, you made that ridiculous bet with me when you found out that one stripper was my former student.”
The “bet” in question was really more of a birthday gift for her.
Amber’s always saying I do nothing impulsive. Nothing just for me. Even the tiny garden in our backyard isn’t mine in any indulgent way. It's practical—only vegetables, just enough to supplement our groceries.
Believe it or not, being a biology professor doesn’t make it easy to make ends meet as a single parent. Amber contributes what she can with her tip-based server salary and from her... extracurricular activities, but things are tight.
She still manages to get out and have fun. And I know she’s right... I don’t do anything for myself. Impulsivity used to be a cornerstone of who I was. Sure, some of that fades with age—especially when you’re a parent—but the more she brought it up, the more I realized how far I’d drifted from that version of myself.
I am no longer the kind of person people would call reckless. But that night—finding Jonah on stage—something shifted.
When I told Amber who he was, she insisted, practically shoved cash into my bra and pushed me into that back room. Said it was the best birthday present she could ever ask for. I couldn’t deny her—not when I knew she was right, and not when she deserved whatever she wanted for always showing up for me.
Hooking up with him wasn’t on my radar—nor was riding his pretty face and staring at his incomprehensibly long eyelashes until I came in a way I hadn’t in years. I thought he’d give me a private little dance and maybe he’d let me touch his arms and get a better look at his tattoos. I imagined nothing beyond that.
But once the door closed behind me, it felt as if the widow and the mother of two were left in the dimly lit hallway just outside. Inside, it was just me... and him. A young, starry-eyed man, glitter-dusted and watching me like I was some kind of fantastical fairy who came to make his dreams come true.
Logic snapped like a dry twig underfoot. It was like I stepped into a capsule where time, consequence, and responsibility didn’t exist.
Only desire.
Eyes wide, Amber gasps, “Yes. Your former student, that’s right!”
“That’s him,” I say gravely. “He’s our new neighbor.”
