“And what? Have you everaskedhim?”
“A couple of times, but he could never leaveMaggie.”
“Hismom?”
“Yeah.”
But she’sgonenow.
Jed didn’t say it but he didn’t have to, and I tried to picture Pete and I jumping on a plane or a Greyhound bus and hitting the road. Pete hadn’t left Chicago the entire time I’d known him, and he’d never shown any indication ofwantingto.
“It’s worth thinking about,” Jed said when I failed to respond to him for the again. “Sometimes perspective is physical, even when the problemisn’t.”
I had no idea what that meant, and it seemed I’d run out of time to find out. Jed stood and offered me his hand. “I’ve gotta round up Desta and get going. It was good to meet you, Ash. Pete too. Tell him I saidbye,yeah?”
“Um… sure.” I shook Jed’s hand and bumped my fist against his. “Will you visit Glennagain?”
“Maybe. Depends if he sticks around. Dude gets itchy feet, so whoknows?”
The thought of never seeing Jed again lodged whatever words I had in my throat. He walked away, and a part of me seemed to gowithhim.
* * *
Ispentthe rest of the day downtown at the warehouse I rented to store all the paintings and ridiculous sculptures I couldn’t bear to look at. Seriously, what had possessed me to construct a candy skull out of grocery bags? The piece had sold for a stupid amount of money, but I couldn’t live with knowing someone had parted with thousands of dollars for something so asinine and had canceled the sale at the last minute. Would I send it to the show inPortland?
Hellno.
It was late when I got home, tired and covered in dust. Nicola had sent through the dates for the show, and it was in nine days, which meant I had even less time than I’d thought to get my ass in gear. I’d have to go back to the warehouse at dawn, but I’d had enough foroneday.
Pete was in the kitchen cooking dinner for the first time in months, if heating up Danni’s eggplant pasta counted ascooking.
“It totally does,” he said when I mused as much. He slid a bowl along the counter to me. “Besides, it’s better for all of you if I do the dishes, and youknowit.”
I couldn’t argue with that. Pete loved his food, but cooking from scratch wasn’t his thing. Shit got broken and burned, and he got grouchy about it realquick.
We made short work of Danni’s pasta, and then I swiped the dishes from Pete and dumped them in the sink. I turned the faucet to hot and left them to soak. “I’ll do them in themorning.”
“Aren’t you going to the warehouse firstthing?”
“Then I’ll do them when I get back. C’mon, let’s gotobed.”
Pete didn’t take much persuading, and he was on me the moment we hit the bedroom. Clothes littered the hardwood floor, and he climbed over me on the bed, pinning me down with just enough weight. For a split second, I thought he wanted to fuck me, but then he straddled my waist, and I was too far gone to be disappointed. I’d take Pete any way I could have him, and watching him get off as he rode my cock? Yeah, I wasn’t gonna complainaboutthat.
After, we lay in the toasty warmth of the killer heating system. “I really should turn that down.” I absently drew patterns on Pete’s chest. “It can’t be good for the planet to have it upsohigh.”
Pete snorted softly. “Fuck it. We recycle pretty much everything except our blood. I wannabewarm.”
I hummed and closed my eyes, halfway to sleep already, but Pete got up and left the bed. “Where are yougoing?”
“Kitchen. I brought something homeforyou.”
I half expected him to appear with a carton of cherry pie or tiramisu—dessert was my crack these days—so I was surprised when he returned to bed with apostcard.
“Glenn told me to give it to you. I think it’s from Jed, but it’s in Chinese or some shit, so Icouldn’ttell.”
Pete slid under the covers, apparently uninterested, while I studied the script someone had written on the postcard. I recognized it as Arabic from ink I’d done, but I had no idea whatitsaid.
I retrieved my phone from my jeans and opened up the app I used to translate text for tattoo designs. It wasn’t one hundred percent reliable, and I usually checked with a native speaker where I could, but it would give me aroughidea.
