The Wrong Kind of Right

chapter 2

I told myself I wasn't going to think about it.

I told myself that for exactly six hours, right up until I heard her laugh through the kitchen window while she was on the phone with someone — a friend, probably, judging by the way she groaned dramatically about the drive up — and something in my chest did a stupid, unwelcome thing.

I ignored it. I had a boat to get back in the water before Saturday and a father who kept "checking in" on the yard like I hadn't been running it fine without him for two years.

"She's staying in the guest room," my mother said that evening, like this was information I needed and not something I already knew, having personally shown Aria to said guest room.

"I'm aware."

"Just — be nice, Ethan."

"I'm always nice."

My mother gave me a look that suggested she remembered the exact tone I'd used on the porch earlier, but she let it go, which was worse, honestly, than if she'd said something.

I found Aria in the kitchen the next morning before the yard opened, mug of coffee in hand, hair a disaster, wearing one of my old college T-shirts she must have found in the guest room dresser. She looked up when I came in and had the decency to look at least a little sheepish about it.

"Found this in a drawer. Figured it was fair game."

"That's a twelve-year-old shirt."

"It's soft."

I didn't have a response to that, which annoyed me more than it should have. I poured my own coffee, aware of her watching me in that way people do when they're trying to figure someone out, and I found myself, for the first time in longer than I wanted to admit, not entirely hating being looked at.

"You're up early," I said, mostly to say something.

"Couldn't sleep. New bed. New town. New everything, I guess." She said it lightly, but there was something underneath it — something I recognized, the careful way people talk about things that actually hurt.

I almost asked. I didn't.

Instead I said, "Yard opens at seven. If you're bored enough to be up this early, I could use an extra set of hands sorting inventory."

She raised an eyebrow. "Was that an invitation or a threat?"

"Does it matter?"

For the first time since she'd arrived, she actually smiled — not the polite, careful one from the porch, but something real, something that made the kitchen feel a little less like my kitchen and a little more like ours, which was a thought I filed away immediately under things I was not going to examine.

"I'll get dressed," she said, and left me standing there wondering what exactly I'd just agreed to.