“Nah, I’m pretty sure it’s Wyoming.” She cheesed a grin. “You wanna?”
After the post-gay-bar meltdown and especially after theconversation I overheard in the car, my sister reaching out meant everything to me. I’d spent months concocting tiny joyful moments like grabbing her favorite pastry on my way home from work or remembering which songs she’d been enjoying lately and playing them in the car in the hopes they would mean something to Phoebe, only for her to turn around and offer me the same thing. I knew the courage it took to go there. And maybe for her this wasn’t a step forward, or even all that meaningful—maybe I was looking too hard at something with an honest face, butdammit, that’s who I was. An optimist, constantly seeking the bright side. Just like our dad.
“Yeah,” I said. “Of course. Let’s go.”
Phoebe hopped up, a few pieces of hair coming loose from her short ponytail. “Cool. I already checked the weather. I know you’re big on the visibility,” she mentioned, making her way over to her shoes piled haphazardly by the door.
“I’m not ‘big on’ visibility. You can’t see without it.”
“Uh-huh.” She pulled on her shoes and waited by the door for me to do the same. “So, are we inviting Dex? Is this a thing we think he’d like?”
God, I hoped not. The thought of Dex caring about meteor showers would be too endearing for me to handle in my current state.
“No idea,” I replied. “I don’t care either way.”
She eyed me for a moment, lips in a tight line. Then she smiled and threw open the door. “You totally do.”
“What? What does that mean?” I spluttered, following her out into the dimly lit hallway. Initially, I’d been surprised by Dex’s choice of a smaller country inn, but I’d since decided I preferred the busy wallpaper and vanilla-scented candles to the corporate hotels.
Phoebe moseyed down the hall, casting a glance at the rusty vintage bicycle hung on the wall. “This is what you do. When you say you don’t care, you’re usually, like, losing your mind from how much you care. It’s not a bad thing. It’s just who you are. You care and you want everyone else to care too,” she said, stopping in front of Dex’s door.
I rubbed my sternum. “You don’thaveto do this.”
“No, that’s not what I’m saying. I want to do this. But how many times did you suggest having my birthday party at the planetarium?”
“Too many, apparently.”
“Way too many.” She rapped her knuckles against the door. “Don’t feel bad if he’s like, ‘Why would I waste time looking at the sky?’ I already made him spend too much time outside today.”
I snorted at the uncanny Dex impression as the door opened. Phoebe straightened up with a salesman’s smile, practically shouting the word, “Hi!”
My brain stumbled at the sight of him in a heather gray tee and jeans, hair damp and wild, droplets of water dotting his shoulders. The scent of his soap struck and, as if trained by Pavlov himself, I could’ve sworn I tasted strawberries.
“Christ,” Dex said. “Not another gay bar.”
“There’s a meteor shower,” Phoebe announced. His gaze shifted over her shoulder to me, surely clocking the blush. Hey, I might’ve gotten a sunburn on top of that mountain. He couldn’t know I was still thinking about the elevator.
“Perseids,” he said with a nod.
He knew it by name.
Oblivious to the turmoil screwing with my entire world, Phoebe bounced on her heels. “Wanna see it with us?”
His eyes snagged mine. My haywire brain was pelting me with a myriad of shit, so I had no idea what he saw there that softened the slight tightness in his eyes. “You go ahead. I’ve spent too much time outside today.”
“Loser,” Phoebe replied fondly and walked away. I toyed with the zipper of my hoodie, taking a small step after her.
“You should come,” I said. Dex leaned against the doorframe, seeming impossibly open for the first time, as if he’d taken down every wall and booby trap since we split off to our own rooms an hour ago. “You know it by name.”
“It’s not a one-night-only thing,” he pointed out. I bit my lip, glancing down the hall to where Phoebe was waiting, texting with a small smile.
“Was this you?” I couldn’t bring myself to look at him. “I heard you guys in the car. Did you suggest this as a way for her to be nicer to me?”
“No,” he said. Grudgingly, I met his gaze and something inside my chest constricted under that softness, like I’d found myself standing in quicksand. “Her idea of nice was getting you a Twinkie at the gas station.”
“I have a thing about snack cakes, so thatwasnice.”
“Vi.” He smiled, the corners of his eyes crinkling. I couldn’t breathe. “Go hang out with your sister.”
