The silence stretched for a terrifying three seconds.
I saw Evan’s eyes go wide. I saw the gears turning. He looked at the single slept in bed, then at our matching wet hair.
He blinked, and for a split second, I saw the realization hit him. He knewexactlywhat he had walked in on. He knew why I was flushed. He knew why Cal was standing guard by the dresser.
But he didn’t say a word. He didn’t make a joke. He didn’t ask a question. He just cleared his throat, tearing his eyes away from the bed and fixing them resolutely on the doorframe.
“Right. Well,” Evan said, his voice a little louder than necessary, deliberately ignoring the tension in the room. “Like I said. Pancakes. I looked up this place on Yelp, it’s called Wild Eggs. It has four stars. Apparently, the skillet is life changing.”
He turned around, grabbing the door handle.
“I need coffee,” Evan rambled, stepping out into the hallway and refusing to look back at us. “Like, a gallon of it. So I’m just gonna… head down. Meet me in the lobby. Take your time.”
He pulled the door shut behind him with a definitive click.
Cal and I stood there in the silence.
Cal looked at the beds. Then he looked at me. He let out a long exhale, running a hand through his damp hair.
“He knows,” Cal whispered.
“Yeah,” I breathed, my heart still racing. “He definitely knows.”
“He didn’t want to make it weird,” Cal noted quietly.
“No,” I agreed, grabbing my wallet. “He’s a good guy.”
I walked over to the pristine bed, grabbed the duvet, and messed it up quickly, tossing a pillow on the floor to stage the scene for housekeeping. It felt pointless now, but it was habit.
“Five minutes,” Cal said, watching me. “Let’s go get pancakes.”
Breakfast had been a noisy affair. Evan had decimated a skillet of eggs and potatoes, talking loudly about the upcoming draft changes and completely ignoring the fact that Cal and I had walked into the lobby smelling like the same soap.
In fact, Evan seemed to be making a concerted effort to include Cal in the conversation, dropping the “Deadlock” insults down to a manageable simmer. It was his way of saying,I know, I’m not judging, let’s just eat.
Now, we were wandering East Market Street, aiming for the “NuLu” district Evan had read about.
“We need culture,” Evan insisted, checking his phone map. “We spend our lives in arenas and airports. We need to see something that isn’t made of concrete.”
“I see plenty of culture,” Cal drawled, walking backward to face us. He stopped suddenly, pointing at a brick storefront with peeling paint. “Ooh. Forget culture. We’re going in there.”
The sign read:BAKER’S CURIOSITIES & VINTAGE.
“Cal, no,” Evan groaned. “That place looks like it smells like tuberculosis.”
“Don’t be a coward, Evan,” Cal grinned, grabbing the handle and shoving the door open. “Maybe they sell souls. You could finally buy one.”
We walked in. The bell chimed, and the smell of old paper, dust, and incense rolled out. It was a chaotic maze of taxidermy, old medical equipment, and shelves overflowing with junk.
Cal immediately beelined for a glass case.
“Evan, look,” Cal called out, pointing to a taxidermy squirrel that had been dressed in a tiny cowboy outfit, holding a banjo. “It’s you. The resemblance is uncanny. Same dead eyes.”
“I hate you,” Evan muttered, though he walked over to look at it. “It’s actually kind of cute. In a nightmare way.”
I wandered toward the back, trailing my hand along a dusty counter.
That’s when I saw it.
