Shay preened. “I knew that,” he said.
“You absolutely didn’t,” I said.
“We’re all living in the magic of the moment, Charles.”
Felix arrived three minutes later. Right on time. Also predicted.
He had his hands in his coat pockets and the same composed face he wore for media. The difference, now, was that when he saw Shay in our hallway, his shoulders loosened half a degree.
Half a degree didn’t look like much. You had to know him.
I knew him.
“Hey,” Shay said.
“Hey,” Felix said.
No fanfare. No weirdness. Just that.
Henry took Felix’s coat with the same efficient care he took with everything and steered us all toward the living room.
“Ten minutes,” he told the room. “Then you’re sitting down.”
“Is this a threat or a promise?” Shay asked.
“Yes,” Henry said, and went back to the kitchen.
Dinner had the volume it was supposed to.
Kieran and Mivo weren’t here to do their usual tag,team chaos, but Shay was more than capable of compensating for two absent idiots. He had a story about Reeves, a rental car, and a misunderstanding at a drive,thru that I suspected had started as a minor inconvenience and been upgraded to epic through repetition.
Henry poured wine. I played host in the way I always did now , topping up glasses, throwing in the occasional line, letting Shay have the center of the table when he wanted it.
Felix sat opposite me.
He was… lighter. That was the only word I had for it. His posture was still Felix , straight, composed, attentive , but something in his face had relaxed. The crease between his brows, the one that appeared whenever he was quietly running twelve versions of something in his head, was taking the night off.
Shay was talking with his hands, illustrating Reeves’ indignation about sauce packets. Henry was pretending not to be amused and failing. I was watching all of it , the table, the food, the man who had once called me reckless like it was a character flaw, now laughing into his glass when Shay mimicked Reeves’ voice with unsettling accuracy.
“And then the guy goes, ‘Sir, you orderedonenugget,’” Shay said, outraged on Reeves’ behalf. “Who ordersonenugget? That’s a cry for help.”
“It was an input error,” Felix said.
“You’re an input error,” Shay said automatically.
Felix’s mouth curved.
“Reeves panicked,” Shay continued. “He didn’t know what to do. Do you know what that man did?”
“Accepted the single nugget and went home to reconsider his life choices?” I asked.
“He drove around and got back in the drive,thru line,” Shay said. “For fifteen minutes.”
“He did not,” Henry said, appalled and delighted in equal measure.
“Ask him,” Shay said. “Fifteen minutes. For sauce.”
“Commitment,” I said.
