“And how many kids do you want?”
“Zero or two,” he says without hesitation.
I glance up as he loosens the tie around his neck—one that I can so perfectly picture Agnes buying for him. It’s navy blue with yellow-and-white stripes.
He shrugs. “What? I guess I’m kind of an all-in or not-at-all kind of guy.”
“Okay,” I say. “And I’ll go with twelve and forty-three.”
He balks at that.
“If anything, it’d prove that you’re in... uh, good health.”
“Okay,” he says. “Now what?”
I swivel the notebook around and hand him the pencil. “Close your eyes and draw a spiral down there at the bottom of the page.”
He does as I say, his lips splitting into a slow grin.
“Now stop.”
I count the lines in his spiral like Hattie and I would when we were kids. When we’d play MASH, I’d think of the results as this distinctly adult life that we would someday have.
But that’s not the case, because I feel like an adult now. I live at home with my dad. I’m not married. I don’t have kids, or a car even, and I won’t be eighteen until next summer, but childhood ended long ago. It seems to me that childhood ends and adult life begins the moment you stop believing your parents can rescue you. As much as I love my dad, I stopped thinking that a long time ago.
“Twenty-two,” I say.
I count to eleven starting withMfor mansion and go through each category until I’ve got answers for every category. “Well,” I tell him, “you’re going to live in a mansion with zero children. You will drive a Winnebago. And you’ll be married to... me.” My neck does that thing again where it fills with heat.
“Let me see that.” He takes the paper from me and studies it very carefully. “Well,” he finally says, “you can’targue with science.” He takes a spider ring from the bowl of old Halloween candy, reaches across the table, and takes my hand. “Ramona Blue Leroux—wait, I don’t know your middle name.”
I pull my hand back a little, but he doesn’t let go. “I don’t have one.”
He shakes his head in disbelief. “I think that makes you soulless in some cultures. Just FYI. But whatever. Ramona Blue Leroux, will you spend the rest of your life with me in a mansion with our zero children? Till death do us part?”
“Fine, but I’m only doing it for the ring.”
He pushes the black spider ring down my finger right next to my mood ring, which is a pinky-mauve color at the moment, and finally lets go of my hand. He cradles my hand in his for one... two... three... four... five...
I pull back and take a sip of the hot toddy we’ve been passing back and forth. “I need some air.” I never feel awkward around Freddie, but right now I’m hyperaware of every little thing right down to my breathing.
“Yeah. Let’s go out back.”
I lead the way and plop down on the porch swing in the backyard.
Freddie sits down next to me without turning on the patio lights, and we swing together in the dark for a few minutes. I fidget with the spider ring on my finger, and even think about taking it off, but that’s dumb. Freddie was just joking, and so was I.
“You ever been flounder fishing?” I ask, searching for anything that doesn’t have to do with the future.
“No,” he says. “I’ve actually never been fishing at all.”
“What? You gotta be kidding me.”
“I guess it wasn’t really Gramps’s thing.”
“My dad used to take us before he got promoted at the hotel. Back when he had more time.” I let my toes skid along the cement as we keep swinging back and forth. “Or maybe it was that we were younger and wanted to be with him more. You know all those people you see on the beach at night in galoshes with big old flashlights and buckets? They’re fishing for flounder.”
He smiles, his teeth sparkling beneath the moonlight. “I used to think those were pixies or giant fireflies or something.”
