He nodded. “Good. You seem… settled.”
“For the most part.” The words felt inadequate because there was an ache under them that had nothing to do with apartment leases and coffee orders. It was older and rawer, and I could feel it laying out stakes I wasn’t ready to accept.
He set the tools down and, on some whim that might have been just the strangest form of courtesy, he stood and offered me his hand to help me up. Our palms touched, his warm and firm with the callus of someone who covered his living by hand.
The touch was mundane enough in any other context. But in the quiet of the garage, with the afternoon folding around us, it felt like a contract. I curled my fingers around his and let him haul me up, and when I rose I found him very close—so close that I could see the fleck of pa
