Relief caused Merritt to take too long a pause.
Evie leaned her head toward Merritt, as if trying to hear someone through mumbles. “There’s something you’re not telling me, which is fine because we met thirty seconds ago, but I think maybe you could use a cup of coffee?”
Merritt said that she could, and the two women small-talked while Evie fiddled with the kettle and the French press. She asked Evie about her freelance work, and Evie asked Merritt about her job at the bookstore and the Samantha Irby book they had both recently read. Merritt immediately liked this woman.
“Now,” Evie said, handing Merritt a mug of deep black coffee, “drink that, while I tell you embarrassing stories from Whit’s childhood.”
Merritt laughed harder than she expected.
“Well,” a voice said from the doorway. “This is a harrowing sight.”
It was Whit, holding a now unnecessary box of tea. His voice flipped a switch in Merritt, her fuzzy uncertainty returning at speed. She set her jaw.
“What did you hear?” Evie demanded, jutting out an accusatory finger.
“Just threatening laughter, that’s all.”
“Good,” she said, and that made both her and Merritt laugh again.
Whit looked genuinely frightened. He stood a little stupidly for a moment before finally speaking up again.
“Well, should we get to work?”
Merritt looked to Evie, who was clearly crestfallen at having lost the chance to divulge juicy details about her brother’s past.
She sighed.
“Okay. If we must.”
Things were off today, and Whit chastised himself. He had been so focused on Annie and on Evie being in town, and then when the time came, he’d been nervous about his sister meeting Merritt—so nervous that he’d made up the false pretense of going out for more tea in order to avoid bumbling through their initial meeting. Driving back from the store, he’d imagined that maybe somehow they could go straight back to normal, but then he’d had to watch as Merritt’s face went from laughing naturally with Evie to a strained, toothy grin at the sight of him.
Merritt sat there typing at the kitchen table, and even the sound of her keystrokes seemed unusually upbeat.
“What?” he said, thinking she’d spoken.
She looked up, her eyes too wide and her smile too polite. “Hm?”
“I thought...”
“I didn’t say anything.”
“Oh.”
He tried to turn his wince into a smile.God, if you wanted to take me now, you could.
More silence. This was stupid. He should just acknowledge what happened. He geared himself up to speak, but when he opened his mouth, his lips rebelled, flopping around uselessly like the jowls of a bloodhound.
Mercifully, Evie appeared.
“I’m going to do some errands before I pick up Annie,” she said from the archway that connected the breakfast room to the hall. “Do you need anything?”
Whit tried not to look like a puppy being left at the pound.
“I’m good,” he said, hesitantly. “Do you?”
“All good here!” Merritt said, her voice chipper in a way he usually associated with cartoon chipmunks.
Evie stared for a moment at the trainwreck before her, then turned her gaze to Whit.
