Page 31 of How To Not Need You

Me: Honestly, that’s possible. I don’t think we should count it out just yet.

I read it again. Grin like an idiot. Set the phone face-down on the counter like that will somehow stop me from picking it up again. It doesn’t. I pick it up. Read it again. Put it down.

This is ridiculous. I’m thirty-five years old. I’ve walked into burning buildings without this much nervous energy. I should not be this worked up over a woman who could probably destroy me with a simple sentence.

And yet.

There’s a bunch of flowers on the kitchen counter. Grocery-store bouquet. Still in the plastic wrap because I haven’t quite committed to taking them out, like somehow leaving them wrapped makes the whole thing less cheesy. White daisies, some blue things I can’t name, a sprig of greenery that the cashier assured me “makes it look fancy.” They cost twelve dollars. I almost put them back twice.

The clock on the microwave tells me I have an hour. We’re meeting at six. The restaurant is fifteen minutes away if I hit both green lights on Main Street, which I never do. I should leave by 5:30 to be safe. 5:25 if I want to be early, which I do, because being early is the closest thing I have to a way of managing my nerves.

I straighten a stack of mail on the counter that was already straight. I wipe a smudge off the faucet that might have been imaginary. I run my hand through my hair and immediately regret it because now it’s doing that thing where the front stands up like I’ve been electrocuted, and I have to wet my palm and press it down, which just makes it worse.

Tilly’s drawing is still taped to the fridge. The one from the art fundraiser, the portrait of Liv with purple hair and glitter eyebrows. Every time I open the fridge I see it, when I do, I can’t help but smile. It’s been there for four days. I have no plans to take it down.

The last time I went on a first date, Tilly was still in nappies and Megan and I had just signed the papers. I wore a shirt with a coffee stain I’d tried to hide with a jacket. I spent the entire evening talking about fire safety codes and my daughter’s latest obsession with garden snails. She did not text me back for a second date.

This is different. This is Liv, who laughed at my bad joke about Luca before I’d even finished telling it. Liv, who stood in a gymnasium full of paint-splattered children and looked more at home than I’ve ever seen her. Liv, whose texts are sharp and warm and make me feel like I’ve won something I didn’t know I was playing for.

My phone rings.

The sound cuts through the quiet room like a siren. I grab it before the second ring, and Megan’s name is on the screen. I answer immediately in concern. She never usually calls me unless it’s important.

“Hey.”

“Jake.” Her voice is tight. The kind of tight that means something’s gone wrong and she’s been holding it together. “I’m so sorry.”

“It’s okay. What’s up?”

There’s a rush of explanation. A burst pipe at a client’s property. Water everywhere. Emergency plumber on the way but he can’t get there for another hour, and she needs to be there to let him in.

“Can you have Tilly?” she asks, and the apology in her voice is genuine. She doesn’t do this. We have a schedule, we stick to it, emergencies are rare and we have gotten good at helping each other out when needed.

“Of course.” No hesitation in it. I know that she would do the same for me.

“Thank you. Seriously. I’ll drop her now.”

“Drive safe.”

She hangs up. I set the phone down on the counter and look at the flowers. The quiet house is about to get loud again. The date is officially on hold. The shirt with buttons will probably acquire peanut butter within the first five minutes of Tilly’s arrival, because that is simply the natural order of things.

I don’t feel disappointed. Not exactly. Tilly comes first. She always does. Liv knows that. Or she will, if she sticks around long enough to find out. I pick up my phone. Open the text thread. Stare at the screen.

Time to tell her I’m cancelling our first date because my ex-wife has a burst pipe and my five-year-old is coming home.

Somehow, I don’t think that’s going to make the cut for romantic comedies. I’m still staring at the message box when headlights sweep across the front window.

Tilly hits the ground running. Golden curls flying, backpack bouncing against her shoulder blades. She blows past me on the porch, already announcing to the empty house that she wants the dinosaur pasta, and also can we watch the movie with the robots, and also did I remember to buy the purple yogurt, because the green one is “basically poison, Dad, everyone knows that.”

The screen door slams behind her. I don’t move. Megan stays near the door, keys still in her hand, looking like she’s been problem-solving since the second the pipe burst.

While Tilly disappears inside, I make Megan a coffee for the road. She takes it. Her fingers wrap around the cardboard and I watch her shoulders drop. First deep breath she’s taken in hours, probably.

“Thank you,” she says, and means it.

“Bad one?”

“Client’s bathroom looks like a swimming pool. And not the fun kind.” She takes another sip.