“Get outside.Now,” she commands, likely thinking the same thing I am. That someone is in the house. Right now.
We jog across the patio toward the driveway, ready to sprint up the road to safety. The afternoon daylight might feel like a security blanket in itself—but I run anyway.
And then I see him. Rory. Walking down Mom’s driveway, as though he left our house moments ago.
“Hey,” I shout, trotting up behind him. Relief and confusion mix in my head, though my tone is casual.
Rory turns, walking back up the hill until we’re face-to-face on the concrete driveway, consumed by the thick trees lining the road. Amelia is already dialing 911.
“Hey,” he copies, hands sliding out of his jean pockets. “I came by to see if you needed any help. Must have just missed you.”
His response is smooth, yet suspicion spikes. I almost can’treconcile him walking away from what looks like a crime scene. But Rory would never do something like this. He knows how hard it’s been for me to be back here, stuck in a house that harbors the memory of a woman I miss so dearly. Every minute in that house, going through her things, smelling her, missing her, is agonizing. Over dinner at the Holloways’ last night, I explained all of this—using it to justify my desire to sell. As though he’d conceal some reason to stifle my progress anyway.
“Someone came into the house,” I blurt. “They unpacked a bunch of stuff.” My stomach knots, reacting to the uncertainty of the intruder’s location.
Rory looks startled. “What? Today?”
“Can we wait at your house until the police get here?” I ask, already guiding Amelia down the street.
“Of course,” he says. He takes a protective stance, peering at the house behind me. “Whatever you need.”
After last night, I’d hoped our next meeting would be quieter, maybe even more private—to feel the weight of what we haven’t done or said. This, traipsing down the road, with the house half torn apart and looming in the growing distance, Amelia nearby and on the phone with a dispatcher, feels anything but intimate. It’s another elephant in the circus of our history.
“What a mess,” I say, leaning against his yard’s iron gate, more for balance than comfort. “But it was sweet of you to come by and help. God knows we could use it after today.”
“Well, I couldn’t stay away after last night,” he says. His voice is low, body leaning into mine. The faintest trace of cologne cuts through the grassy air.
I bite back a laugh but fail. I’m almost embarrassed, like my heartbeat is playing over loudspeakers.
Amelia walks over, still glued to her phone, but manages to tuck it against her shoulder long enough to wrap Rory in a one-armed hug.
“You look good! How have you been?” she whispers, her cell’s microphone on her neck.
Rory chuckles, offering her two thumbs-up. “Doing all right. It’s good to see you.”
Amelia pauses, listening. “Sorry, no. I was talking to someone,” she says into her phone. “How far away are they now?”
After a beat, she holds up her index finger and mouths,One minute.
“Anyway, yeah,” Rory says as Amelia circles the yard aimlessly. “I thought coming by would be a good excuse to see you. And help out. It’s not like we have to wait until we’re both back in the city.”
“Well, lucky for you, this little disaster may have stretched our stay. So”—I let the words hang—“you can see me as much as you want.”
His smile tilts. “Then I should take you out tonight. Could be a good distraction. Get you out of that house.”
A small pit forms in my stomach at the idea, happily replacing worry. “What’d you have in mind?”
“The Waterside is screeningPsychoat 7:00. Could be fun.”
The Waterside—half restaurant, half four-screen cinema—rests on the lip of Lake Blair. It’s stitched into every summer I’ve spent here: neon-lit marquee glimmering off the water, idyllic patio seating for post- or pre-movie discussions, themed cocktails for each film. It’s my favorite place in Blair.
“Sounds like my perfect night,” I say, softer than I mean to. “I’m in.”
And just like that, I’m snapped into reality as blue and red lights flash in my peripherals, rolling past the Holloways’ house and up Mom’s steep driveway. The three of us follow its steady ascent in gauche silence.
Two officers sweep the house before waving us inside. “All clear,”one tells us, but the words feel hollow when I step into the living room and see the wreckage again: boxes gaping open, office papers and mementos littered across the floor like flotsam after a typhoon.
Amelia and I plop on the couch to steady ourselves, Rory standing by the windows for moral support, his stunned expression matching ours.
