SpacePope:holy shit what on earth
SpacePope:“It’s hot” is an affirmative defense. Source: I went to law school
SpacePope:Although to be fair the Pegasus Coalition aren’t space communists so much as anti-colonialist space warriors
HowlsMovingSpaceship:True, my bad
SpacePope:Do we think Charlie Blake understands the implications? I know three people with that tattoo and I’ve had to bail two of them out of jail MULTIPLE times but only for good reasons if you catch my drift
HowlsMovingSpaceship:I hate to say this but I don’t think Charlie Blake has understood a lot of implications in his life. He strikes me as not exactly a thinker
SpacePope:oh god I feel really mean because he seems NICE. but yeah, same
Chapter Six
Simon’s therapist—a semiretired seventy-five-year-old who works out of her home in Laurel Canyon and decided to let the entire concept of telehealth pass her by—wants him to sit with the discomfort. Instead of repeatedly counting electrical outlets and arranging objects at right angles and indulging every other whim his synapses throw at him, he’s supposed to acknowledge the impulse and ride it out.
That is not working so well for Simon at the moment.
Hiding in his bedroom while Jamie uses every single bowl in the house to do a dry run of Simon’s birthday cake, Simon looks into changing his ticket to New York. His sublet doesn’t start until next week, but he could spend a few days at a hotel. Surely he can manufacture some reason why he needs to be there early.
But he won’t lie to Jamie. Jamie would figure it out and then his feelings would be hurt, and he’d be even more hurt that Simon didn’t tell him what was wrong. If Simon admitted that the kitchen mess bothers him, Jamie would stop making messes, but then Jamie would know that Simon is the kind of nightmare ingrate who complains about the mess someone makes while theybake him a literal birthday cake.
And the thing is, he wants the cake. He wants to like it, wantsto be the kind of person who likes it. He wants to help Jamie make the cake and then sit on the sofa and judgmentally watch HGTV together without swatting away intrusive thoughts the entire time. He misses his old meds. They weren’t perfect, but now he regrets every minute he didn’t appreciate only being a moderate basket case.
So instead, he takes Edie on a walk. They’ve been doing this a lot, so many walks that she looks askance at her leash and also at Simon when he says the magic wordwalk. The sun is just starting to set, so the light is coming in at a brutal angle. He puts on his darkest glasses and hopes for the best.
If anyone asked, Simon would swear that when he bought his house, he didn’t know Charlie lived less than half a mile away. He’d be lying, but he’d say it anyway.
It’s just that he fell in love with the house. It’s a 1930s Tudor with arched doorways and built-in bookcases so tall they need a ladder, and it’s small enough to encourage his family to stay at a hotel when they’re in town. He loves the house more than he dislikes Charlie.
Besides, it’s not like they’re next-door neighbors. They only bump into one another on the rare occasions that Simon’s walking Edie while Charlie’s out for a run. Once a month, maybe, because Edie isn’t interested in exercise and neither is Simon. Still, in the four years Simon’s lived here, he’s learned to recognize Charlie from a hundred yards away. That gives him just the right amount of time to stir up a nice panic about what he’s supposed to say or whether it’s stupid to wave.
Tonight, when he realizes that the man jogging toward him is Charlie, his heart picks up immediately from the usual combination of irritation and reluctant attraction, but both of those thingsare now somehow informed by the experience of sitting too close at lunch. When they said goodbye outside the restaurant, it had been almost friendly, or at least closer to friendly than they’ve ever gotten. Maybe they trauma bonded over their failure to make conversation.
He attempts a smile that’s maybe ten percent warmer than his usual “the social compact compels me to smile at my neighbors” smile.
Charlie stops running. “Oh, hey.” He gestures at Edie. “Can I?”
“Of course.”
Charlie kneels and holds out his hand to Edie, who sniffs it politely. His T-shirt is one of those fabrics that’s supposed to wick sweat. It’s soaked through and clinging. If Simon takes off his sunglasses, it’s not because he needs an unimpeded view.
“I was going to text you,” Charlie says, getting to his feet, “but I have to go to Phoenix tomorrow. I should be back in a few days.”
“We’re on a deadline here.” Simon sounds peeved and insufferable even to his own ears.
“I still can’t get in touch with my stepfather, so I’m going to go check on him. Or at least check on his house, maybe file a missing persons report. Shouldn’t take too long.”
And now Simon feels like a dick because missing relatives do take priority over whatever nonsense the two of them are up to. “I’m sorry to hear that.”
“I’ve spent the day on the phone with every hospital in Maricopa County. Did you know that if you give someone’s name, they’ll tell you if that person is a patient? I thought that only worked on television. Thing is, if I call the cops to check on him, it’s not gonna end well. So I’ll just do it myself—”
“Okay,” Simon says, because Charlie said that all in one rush, not pausing for air. He thinks about telling Charlie to take a deep breath, but Simon would personally knife anyone who tried that on him.
“I would’ve flown out tonight,” Charlie says, a little defensive, “but there weren’t any seats. I checked every airline that has a direct flight, and flyingstandbyseemed—”
“All right,” Simon says, taken aback. “Nobody’s asking you to fly standby. Just go and find your stepfather and don’t worry about the rest of it.”
