“You bring me here. You make me swim. We're actually getting along for once, which, if you remember, isn't our natural state.” His voice was tight and controlled, the kind that meant he was angrier than he was letting on. “And then you flip a switch and act like I'm the problem. If you didn't want to be around me, you should've just left me at the house.”
“That's not what this is.”
“No? Then explain it to me. Walk me through the logic, because from where I'm sitting, you did something nice and then punished both of us for it.”
I gripped the wheel. “You needed to get out. You looked like you were going to lose your mind cooped up in the house. I didn't know what else to do that wouldn't turn into a fight.”
He was quiet for a beat. “You could've just said that.”
“Would you have listened?”
“Probably not.” A pause. “But I might've been less of an asshole about the swim trunks.”
“That's not a high bar.”
“No,” he agreed. “It's really not.”
We drove the rest of the way in silence that had lost most of its edge but was still carrying weight. When we got back to the house, Troy headed inside first. I stayed in the truck with my hands on the wheel and my head tipped back, staring at the ceiling liner and trying to get a handle on what had just happened.
It would settle. It had to settle. I just needed to get some distance and stop letting him get under my skin every time he was in the same room.
I told myself that all the way inside. Told myself that while I made dinner and Troy sat at the table pretending to look at his phone. Told myself that through the careful politeness we'd fallen back into, the kind that kept us at a manageable distance without actually requiring either of us to address anything.
I didn't know what came next. All I knew was that being near Troy was no longer neutral. Every conversation felt heavier than it should. Every casual touch landed and stayed. I was in serious trouble if I didn't figure out how to get a grip on this before it became something I couldn't walk back from.
This was temporary. He'd go back to London eventually and I'd have my house and my life back and enough distance to remember why this could never happen. I just had to hold on until then.
I just had to keep him at arm's length and stop noticing the way he moved through space like he owned it. Stop noticing the way his voice sounded when he actually laughed. Stop noticing the heat of his hand against my shoulder in cold water.
I closed my eyes and waited for sleep that didn't come. The house settled around me with familiar sounds that should have been comforting but just felt like reminders that I wasn't alone anymore.
SIX
OFF LEASH
DECLAN
I'd been running for forty minutes when I stopped at the coffee shop on the corner of Ashland and Division. The place was small and cramped, surviving on regulars who knew exactly what they wanted and didn't need a menu to order it. I pulled out my earbuds and let the bass line from some old Foo Fighters track fade into background noise while I waited in line.
The kid behind the counter knew my order without asking. Black coffee, large, nothing added. He had it ready by the time I reached the register.
“Rough morning?” he asked.
“Just a long one.”
“Yeah, well. Coffee helps.”
I paid and took the cup outside, letting the cold air hit my face while I drank the first sip. It was too hot and burned going down but I didn't care. I needed the heat and the bitterness and the routine of doing this same thing every Saturday morning like it meant nothing.
The run was supposed to clear my head. That was the whole point. Get up early, put on the same shoes I'd been wearing for three years, follow the same route through the same streets, and let my body take over while my brain shut the fuck up for an hour.
My brain wasn't cooperating.
I'd spent the previous evening trying to convince myself that yesterday at the pool didn't mean anything. But I'd been lying awake at three in the morning staring at the ceiling and thinking about the way Troy had looked in the water, and that wasn't off-balance. That was a problem I didn't know how to solve.
I finished half the coffee, tossed the rest in a trash can, and put my earbuds back in. I pushed harder than I needed to on the return stretch, letting my legs burn and my lungs work until the only thing I could focus on was the rhythm of my feet against pavement.
The route took me through a residential neighborhood just starting to wake up. A few people were out walking dogs or grabbing newspapers from their front steps. Cars sat cold in driveways with frost still on the windshields. The sky was gray and heavy with the promise of snow that probably wouldn't come for another few hours.
