And anyway, between the two of them, shewasthe travel expert, no argument there. Over the last year and a half—ever since that day he’d shown up in Boston—Layla had kept on with her work as a locum tenens, an arrangement that had been both difficult and right for the two of them. In their weeks apart, he missedher—sometimes, enough to get his wires crossed, his pain kicking up strangely—but it was good for him to deal with it, to keep talking about it at his appointments, to distract himself with his work, to tell her about it without shame. It was good for them to talk on the phone, for him to see his own face on a screen for video calls and how she smiled with delight at it; it was good to think of ways to stay close to someone, to get to know someone who was—especially in those early months—still so new to him.
Even if that someone was often far away.
But when Layla wasn’t far away—when she flew to him in between, when she started staying longer, when she agreed to move the things she had in storage to his place—that was better than good; that was how he learned her best. That’s how he knew all the sounds she could truly sleep through, the candy wrappers she always had in her scrubs pockets, the way she made a grilled cheese all wrong, the quickness with which she could pick up something like crocheting, at least as long as his mom was showing her. That’s how he knew that she had it in her to do a goofy dance when she was right about something, that her real, honest laugh was louder than he would have ever guessed, that sometimes, she liked to be held so close and tight that he thought it might hurt her.
“I’m not so bad anymore,” he’d said back to her, after the littletravel expertdance, and she’d made aHmming noise, conceding the point.
They were, after all, about to board an international flight.
Hewasn’tso bad anymore about traveling, not after he’d also gone to see her in various cities, each time a little easier. He couldn’t say he liked it—the bland apartments she stayed in, the beds he hated except that she was in them, all the new things there were to get used to in every place—but Layla was worth it. Seeing her off to work, taking care of her after a shift, that was worth it.Making plans to take her places—restaurants, parks, whatever he could find in whatever town she was in—that was worth it. Every time, she was happy. Every time, it reminded him of how she’d built a bell tower for herself once, too.
It reminded him of how they’d climbed down together.
And anyway, it’d been good practice for this. The trip they’d planned together, for one of her longer breaks between placements.
The trip for which he’d tacked something extra on.
“Mom,” a small voice whispered nearby, a note to it that was well familiar to him by now—more so, surely, for all the time he spent outside, no hat, these days. Subtly, he turned his face and saw the source: a kid whose age he couldn’t guess, but stood only knee-high to his mother, who was holding his hand tightly, obviously trying to rush him past where Griffin stood.
“Look at his—” the kid was saying, as his mothershushedhim harshly, giving Griffin a weak, apologetic smile, her eyes cast mostly down as she passed.
Griffin waited, knowing the lagging kid would eventually look back.
When he did, Griffin lifted his left hand and waved, stifling a laugh when the kid squeaked—in delight or fear, or some combination—and stumbled against his mother’s leg.
“I better savor this,” Layla announced, coming back to his side after her trip to the nearest coffee kiosk. She had a to-go cup large enough to give a lesser person—him, certainly—a caffeine-induced heart event. “My lastrealcoffee fortwo weeks!”
He smiled down at her, leaned in to press a kiss to the corner of her mouth. “Don’t let anyone there hear you say that.”
She mimed zipping her lips shut, gave a passing glance at the kid and his mom before turning back to Griffin, unbothered.Another good thing between them, how they’d gotten through this: Layla’s anxiety, in the first year or so they were together, about the kids question. For a while, it felt like anytime they were in the presence of any random kid, Layla would watch him too close—waiting for some tell, some look of longing in him.
He had not been lying to her in Paris: There was no future, real or imagined, he wanted more than he wanted to be with Layla. But it’d taken a lot of convincing to get her to understand that it went beyond that: that he had not, even before her, even before the fire, ever seen himself with kids, that it was not something he wanted for his life.
I’ll tell you however many times you need to hear it, he’d told her one night, a few months ago.I’ll keep pulling you back from whatever gate you’re thinking of going through.
That, finally—after all the nights she’d hung in there with him, waiting while he fought off the shades—seemed to get through to her.
It was part of why this particular trip felt special. Important.
Only part, though.
The other part, he had been keeping a secret.
He took what he hoped was a subtle breath through his nose, made note of the needle-feeling under his left armpit, didn’t dwell.
He said, “Eighty-eight minutes,” in a way that he hoped betrayed nothing of his nervous anticipation.
“Okay,” Layla said, taking a sip of her coffee. “Let’s walk for a while.”
* * *
Even for first class, boarding had been touch and go.
Meaning, Griffin had been touched a lot, by accident—by afellow passenger, by a flight attendant who moved carelessly, by more than one suitcase—and he wanted togo.
In his seat, he was sweating a little—trying to control it so his skin wouldn’t react, his left leg feeling preternaturally long, a psychosomatic consequence of adjusting to an unfamiliar chair, however comfortable. He thought of the extra clothes he kept in his carry-on now, in case these got damp, the prescription he had if his stress got out of control, the fact that the woman sitting beside him had seen him way worse, and never cared.
He breathed easier, but still.
