“You’re right. It’s agreatidea.”
We pulled down the ladder, and Tyler gestured to me to go up first. I did, remembering the last time we had done this. “I thought you wanted to look at my ass last time this happened.”
“Shira! I am a gentleman,” he said with mock-affront. “I wouldneveradmit that.”
I laughed and climbed into the attic, then pulled the ladder and door up behind me once Tyler had followed. “Nice place,” he said. “You wanna look for some New Year’s decorations? Trip over some floorboards?”
“I don’t hate it.” I took a seat on one of the old wooden chairsand tried to look up at him flirtatiously. “In fact—ah!”
The chair had not, apparently, been resigned to the attic because it no longer matched its downstairs brethren but because it no longer had structural integrity. A leg had given out, and I crashed forward in a rumpled heap.
“Are you okay?” Tyler rushed over, kneeling by my side.
“Ugh.” I rolled over. “I think I bruised my hip. But otherwise, I’m fine.”
“Are you sure?” He peered down at me with concern.
I lifted my hand and tugged at his shirt collar. “Would you like to kiss it better?”
His concern melted away, replaced by a smile. “If you insist.”
God, I liked him.
And I liked this so much. It was passionate and exciting and new and addictive, and I wanted to kiss him forever and ever; I wanted to lie next to him and feel his skin against mine, the inhale and exhale of his breath, feel the cold of his toes—I wanted all of it. All of him.
Maybe thisdidn’thave to come to its inevitable end. Maybe we could continue in New York. We weren’t so far apart, not if you hopped the 1, 2, 3 lines. Tyler might not want a high schooler showing up at the dorms—I could not imagine anything less cool for a college boy—but I was a city girl, and I knew all the places tourists liked to go. And Tyler was still sort of a tourist, wasn’t he? He’d only been in New York one semester. We could go tothe High Line and Chelsea Market, and I’d show him the best parts of Central Park and ice cream in the East Village, and we’d go to the Brooklyn Botanic Garden and—
No. Tyler wasn’t looking for a girlfriend or a tour guide, and I wasn’t looking to torture myself. I would live in the moment. I would accrue enough experience over the next few days that I would have the confidence to embark on actual relationships.
I took a deep breath, trying to focus on something beyond Tyler and me. “Do you think there’s any other secrets hidden up here?”
“You could knock on every floorboard to find out.”
“Maybe I will.” If there were other secrets, I wanted to find them. I wanted to know more about Sarah. Had she been unhappy with her husband or her marriage? How long did her affair last, and who was it with? “I get a teen hiding away her ex’s stuff, but an adult doing that somehow seems... sadder.” I wandered over to the secret compartment. “Maybe we missed something.”
Tyler watched me as I pulled up the floorboard. “Careful. Maybe there’ll be mice.”
“Ha ha.” I swept my phone’s flashlight around the hollow, and once more only found dust and cobwebs. But out of curiosity, I reached my hand in, trailing my fingers around the bottom and the sides. Just in case.
The fourth side wobbled.
“What was that?” I said, wide-eyed.
“What?”
“Look—the fourth side—it didn’t feel stable.”
Tyler came over, and we both lay down on our stomachs to peer at the long wall of the cubbyhole. I poked at it once, twice, and then it swung inward.
“Jesus,” Tyler whispered. “I can’t believe we missed that.”
“We’re the worst Sherlock and Watson ever.”
“Who’s who?”
“Obviously I’m Sherlock.Duh.” I reached inside and pulled out a wrapped bundle. Very carefully this time, I checked for any other objects or fake walls. Nothing.
We placed the bundle on the floor between us. It was a coarse sackcloth bag. From it, I drew a pair of trousers, a belt, and a long strip of cloth.
