For the next twenty minutes, they made their way through the shop’s three rooms—Directors, Genres, and Foreign/Erotic—reshelving DVD cases and hurling premises back and forth like tennis serves. They had just finished in the Genre room when Noah went quiet.
He was looking at the floor as he said, “No one should know how they’re going to die.”
He was seated on the radiator, long legs extended, the picture of ease—but when his eyes flicked to AJ’s, there was fear in them like she had never seen.
“No one should know how they’re going to die,” she repeated, slow. The words tasted like dirt. Something must have happened with his mom.Dr. Clements has the blood test results.What had they shown?
AJ cleared her throat. “Imagine the burden. You’d be living under a shadow, a sword of Damocles—to spend your life dreading this thing,unable to stop it, then one day it just happens. People aren’t meant to live like that.”
Noah nodded, watching her. AJ felt numb.
His lips trembled as he spoke again. “If you’re going to die, it’s better to know.”
“Noah,” AJ breathed. “What happen—”
Noah shook his head, his eyes burning, and AJ understood. The tests had come back inconclusive, and Noah didn’t know if he could watch his mom struggle through another round.
He was asking if she thought they should give up and let the disease run its course.
Tentatively, AJ moved toward the radiator to sit beside him. “Knowledge is agency,” she said finally. “If you know what’s coming, yes, there is fear, but there’s also power. You can make a plan. Modern medicine is amazing. The doctorswillfind a cure and—”
It happened in an instant—Noah’s face began to crumple, and in the split second before he turned away, AJ surged forward, gathering him in her arms. His body went stiff, stunned, and for a moment AJ thought he might shrug her off. He was so much bigger he easily could have.
Then he softened, his hands clutching her so tight her shirt bit into her skin. He didn’t make a sound, but AJ felt his diaphragm spasm, his head heavy on her shoulder as his tears began to spill.
AJ ignored the way her heart stammered at his nearness. She banished the urge to nuzzle his cheek, to inhale his dark, salty scent. Instead she held him fast and let him cry, as if he were Emily, as if he were hers to protect. She did not let go.
The silence that exists between two people contains entire universes,Ezell had written.
They stayed like that until Noah’s breathing evened out, and then a little while yet.
In the days thatfollowed, AJ kept a close watch over Noah. Something had changed—she could sense it. It was as if this last round oftests had upended some fundamental certainty. The fears Noah had kept at bay all summer were now inescapable as a damp mist.
AJ hated to watch him suffer. She had always used humor as a defense, but now it became a bridge, a way of reaching out, of reaching him.
“I can feel you monitoring me,” he said while they watchedSullivan’s Travels.
“Sorry, your existential dread is just really loud today,” said AJ.
He kept his eyes ahead, but AJ saw his mouth quirk. He was noticeably surlier, though never with her. While he’d snarl at Eudora and grumble at Storm, AJ’s presence seemed to calm him.
The main change in their rapport was that Noah no longer spoke about himself. He was content to absorb the minutiae of AJ’s life for hours, but if AJ tried to reciprocate, a cloud would descend.
“Your birthday’s April twenty-first, right?” he asked, thumbing through Storm’sCosmopolitanin search of AJ’s horoscope. He smirked. “Here we go.Beware a Taurus’s temper. They may be mellow as May, but if the bull sees red, amscray!”
“What?” said AJ, grabbing the issue from him. “When’s your birthday?”
Noah immediately shut down.
“When?” said AJ, prodding his bicep.
Noah grabbed her hand to keep her from poking him.
“Tell me.”
Their eyes met, and his expression thawed slightly. “November tenth.”
AJ took her hand back to flip the page. “Let’s see…Scorpio,” she said, skimming the entry. “Whoa, did a Scorpio murder this person’s entire family?”
