I stopped walking and stared at my phone.
I’m so sorry about your dad. Please don’t worry about Aspen, just focus on your family.
I sent it and then stood there in the middle of the hallway, the logistics crashing in. We were going to be in Detroit for two days, then back to Chicago for three, then Buffalo and Nashville. Aspen had been with me for five years, a 60 pound Aussie mix who did not cope well with strangers and had once, memorably, eaten an entire throw pillow when I’d left him with a neighbor for four hours.
There were other dogsitters. Entire apps existed to help you find one. But the idea of a stranger in my apartment, someone Aspen didn’t know, someone I didn’t—
“Is everything okay?”
I looked up. Théo had come around the corner with his skate bag, clearly on his way out. He was watching me with that direct, assessing look, faint concern visible beneath the default guardedness.
I realized I had stopped dead in the middle of the hallway and was frowning at my phone hard enough that apparently it had registered as a crisis from a distance.
“Yeah. Well—no, actually.” I exhaled. “My dogsitter had a family emergency. We leave for Detroit tomorrow and I don’t have—” I ran a hand through my hair. “There are apps for this, I know, but there are some real weirdos out there and I don’t love the idea of a stranger in my apartment. Aspen doesn’t do wellwith new environments. He’s very active—” I stopped. “Sorry. You don’t need my whole situation.”
Théo was quiet for a moment, head tilted slightly.
“I don’t know if I qualify as a non-stranger at this point,” he said. “But I could watch Aspen while you’re gone.”
I stared at him.
That was not the response I’d expected. From anyone, but especially from Théo, who seemed to tolerate my existence at best.
“Does your building allow dogs?” I asked, recovering.
“I’d have to check with Avery.” A beat. “Or I could stay at your place? If that would make him more comfortable. I don’t have a great deal going on at the moment.” He said the last part with the flat, unsparing self-awareness that I was coming to recognize as his particular brand of honesty.
Something in my chest loosened considerably. “You would actually do that? Because I was about to text Morrison’s wife and she’s already got her hands full with Rosie and I really didn’t want to—”
“It’s fine,” he said. “I like dogs.”
“I’d pay you, obviously.”
He held up a hand, a dismissive gesture. Then he reached into the pocket of his cargo pants and pulled out his phone. “Give me your number. Text me your address and I’ll come over tonight. You can show me everything he needs.”
I sent myself a text from his phone, then handed it back.
Our fingers brushed when he took the phone back. His hand was cold but it still sent a shock of awareness up my arm. Then he tucked the phone away and picked up his skate bag.
“What time are you done with practice?” he asked.
“Should be home by six.”
Something moved across his face. Just a small lift at the corner of his lips, there and gone. “I’ll see you tonight, Derek.”
He turned and headed down the corridor, skate bag over one shoulder, unhurried.
I stood there for a moment longer than necessary. Then I shook my head and headed to the locker room to get ready for afternoon skate.
10. Théo
I don’t know why I offered.
It was out of character. I was aware of that even as the words were coming out of my mouth in the hallway—I could watch Aspen—like some part of me had made the decision before consulting the rest. I liked dogs well enough, the same as anyone, but volunteering to housesit and dogsit for a man I had spoken to a handful of times was not something the version of me from four months ago would have recognized.
Maybe it was avoidance. Avery was consumed by hockey—practices, team outings, the first road trip of the season—and I was left rattling around his apartment with too much time and not enough structure. The walls were starting to feel closer every day.
I was still skating almost every morning. Still grinding through workouts in the depressing basement gym. But the hours between were the problem. Empty stretches where my brain circled all the things I was trying not to think about. Coach Miller’s number sat in my phone, burning a hole in my pocket.
