"I was going to," he said, causing me to laugh.
"You would get to the day before the haircut and realize you don't want to drive fifteen hours… that you could get one just as good right where you are. I'll tell you what, if you want to just catch up sometime, for old times' sake, we could maybe meet halfway and have dinner together or something."
"Yeah," he agreed.
"I love this song so much," I said. "Stevie's one of my favorites." The music in the truck was playing quietly, and I reached out to turn it up, but I hesitated and looked at him first. He glanced at me from over the console. "Do you mind?" I asked.
"No, not at all," he answered.
It was Superstition by Stevie Wonder, and at first, it was just me who was singing out loud, but for the last chorus of the song, EJ sang with me. I danced a little jig to the musical outro, and he laughed and shook his head, glancing at me as often as he could as he drove. Another classic song came on. It was something from the eighties, I thought—the Rolling Stones, maybe. I turned it down so that I could point out some things about my city as we drove.
We ended up driving around and looking at things for the next hour. Café Eight was open late, and eventually we stopped for a slice of their famous cake. The conversation with EJ was so fun that I didn't even notice that time was passing. He was a curious person and in a good mood in spite ofdriving all day and then waiting for me while I finished work. I had been having so much fun with him that I felt like I needed to snap out of it when I looked at the clock.
"It's late. Tomorrow's my long day," I said. "Usually I'm in bed by ten-thirty."
"I’m sorry for keeping you up."
"No, I was having fun. You need to stop being funny, though. My face hurts from laughing. This is the road right here. Do you see where we're at now? That's the salon right there. See it? You probably came in from the other direction."
"Yeah, I see it now," he said.
He slowed down as he approached my house.
"Are you dropping me off, or did you want to come in for a second?"
Chapter 8
EJ
"I'd love to come in for a second," he said.
She peered out of the windows. "There's a small lot behind the house that you can access by the alley, but right here on the street is probably easier." She gestured at the parking spots that were open further down, along the side of the street, near the front of her salon. EJ pulled into one of them.
"The house was brown when we bought it," she said after they got out of the truck and began to walk up. "All this was overgrown. It was easy to see the potential, though. They were all pretty easy fixes." He followed her around to the side of the house. It was dark out, but she knew where she was going.
"There's a staircase inside the salon, but I was going to show you this way up. Nico, what are you doing out here?" she said when she rounded the corner and saw a man waiting there. He was standing outside, next to the air conditioning unit. He was dressed nicely in slacks and a button-down shirt that was tucked in with a belt.
"Hello, Savannah. I'm waiting for my friends to pick me up. We're going to Randolph's for jazz at midnight. Carly's playing the bass guitar. Would youlike to come with us?" He glanced at EJ with his eyebrows furrowed. "I guess your friend would be welcome to come, too, if he'd like."
"Oh, thank you, Nico, but my friend is just walking me to my apartment."
"Oh, that's no problem. I can walk you up to your apartment. Your friend can leave. I'm just waiting out here even though my ride won't be here for another six minutes."
"That's okay, but thank you. EJ was coming inside with me for a minute. Thank you, though, Nico."
"Well, it's late," was all he said. His stare was aimed at EJ, and it was serious and impassive.
"No, he's… he'll just be upstairs for a few minutes. We just went out for cake."
Nico nodded and wore a peaceable enough expression, but EJ could tell he was protective of Savannah, which made him happy. There was an edge of regret that he wasn’t the one with the right to be protective of her, but mostly, he was thankful she had people like Nico in her life.
"It was nice meeting you Nico," EJ said, hoping he was in there long enough that Nico would be gone when he finished upstairs.
"See you, Nico!" she called from over her shoulder. "Have fun at jazz night!"
He waved but didn't look too pleased.
EJ followed Savannah up a flight of stairs, where she pointed to the door to Nico's apartment. Theykept going to the third floor, and she unlocked the door to her place. She went inside and flung on the lights with a flourish. She set down her things, and then she twirled around once in the center of the room.
