“Would he be upset to know you’re here with me?” I asked.
“He knows. I had to arrange the time off.”
Time off from what?
“And he was okay with it?”
“He’s going to want to meet you.”
“And if I don’t want to meet him?”
Arden considered it. “Then it makes our friendship more difficult.” My face must have revealed my silent protest because Arden then assured me, “You can walk away at any time. I’d understand.”
I felt, especially in that moment, that our relationship had a short shelf-life—a particular kind of urgency—and I wanted for us to get the most out of it while we could.
“Why don’t you get a couple more hours of work in before we call it a night?”
“I’d understand,” he said again, quietly.
I cameout to the kitchen the next morning to find Arden wearing my father’s bathrobe. It was strange to see the muted plaid I associated with my father to be wrapped around the masculine contours of the man I wanted most intimately.
“I hope you don’t mind. It was hanging in the closet, and it looked so cozy.”
“I don’t mind,” I said as I sat down at the counter.
“I made breakfast.” Arden plated an omelet with veggies and two slices of toast. “I made coffee too. I wasn’t sure if you drank it, but I figured, why not?”
“Thank you. We should have brought cream.”
Arden smiled and dumped a pile of single-serve creamers on the counter. “My dad used to have me fill my pockets with these. It’s one of my many vices.”
“A thief of inconsequential things,” I marveled.
“It would add up if everyone did it. I try not to anymore, but it’s a hard habit to kick.”
“Did you shoplift?”
Arden looked guilty. “Sometimes. Mostly food.”
“Were you hungry a lot?”
“Often enough. My dad complained all the time about how much I ate. I hit my growth spurt with him. When we got back from our first sail, none of my clothes fit properly. Everything was ripped and cut-off, like a real pirate. My aunt told me I looked shipwrecked.”
“Were you ever shipwrecked?”
“No, but there were a few bad storms. And one time my dad left me on an island overnight because I spent his drinking money on a water filter. He came back for me though.”
Arden must have seen my shocked expression. I’d not yet touched my food.
“That must have been traumatic.”
“He felt bad about it, but dysentery is no joke. Eat up. We’ve got work to do.”
We worked all that morning, then went for a hike in the afternoon. Arden told me about the books he’d treasured when he was younger. How he’d read the Bible cover-to-cover three times, and theComplete Works of William Shakespeare, which had belonged to his mother, as well as some old Danielle Steel and Jackie Collins novels he’d “borrowed” from his aunt’s house. “I knew more about female orgasms than I did about men’s,” he said. He’d also read theHarry Potterbooks out of order and spent years trying to acquire a complete set. He said that when he went to a used bookstore, he’d pick the thickest books because he knew they’d take the longest to read.
“I see now why you hoard books.”
“I never knew when we’d ship off again. I never got much notice. Not all books are worth reading multiple times.”
