Page 21 of Tempted By the Safety

She sets her glass down. This is the focus she gets when she’s decided a situation actually matters. “Okay,” she says. “Okay, wow.”

I look down at my glass, at the wine gone warm from how long I’ve been nursing it, and my chest goes tight.

“Yeah,” I say again, quieter, and Emily’s face softens.

She doesn’t say anything for a second. Then she straightens up, pulls in a long breath, and looks around for the server.

“Okay,” she says. “I have a lot of questions. But we’re going to need a lot more wine for this.”

9

Spencer

Paige is telling me about a creative director who got walked out of a fashion house in Milan with security on either side of him, and I’m nodding along, but the story’s background noise.

“—and nobody’s saying his name, obviously, because the NDA’s the size of a phone book, but everyone in the building knows exactly who it is.” Paige spears a piece of scallop and points it at me before she eats it. “You’re not even a little bit interested in this.”

“I’m interested.”

“You’re doing the thing where your face is interested and your eyes are somewhere in New Jersey.”

Paige edits a magazine that puts models on beaches in coats too heavy for the weather, and she reads people the way I read a defense: fast, casual, never letting on how much she’s actually clocking. We’ve been doing this for about a year and a half now. Dinner every few weeks, sometimes more, always ending the same way unless one of us has somewhere else to be. No calls after midnight unless it’s an emergency. No meeting each other’s families. It’s the only kind of arrangement I’ve ever been good at,and Paige is good at it too, which is most of why it’s lasted this long.

I know I’m not sleeping with her tonight, though. I knew it on the drive over. There’s no version of tonight that ends with both of us back at her place, or any place, and it’s got nothing to do with Paige. It’s that I don’t feel like it.

I asked Milo to buy me condoms today because I freaked out about what happened in the dressing room and wanted to reestablish some semblance of control. Now I regret it.

“Spencer.” Paige sets her fork down. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah. Sorry.” I pick up my water glass. “I just have a headache,” I lie.

“Oh, I’m sorry.” She studies me another second. “Well.” She leans in, and her mouth curves into a smile. “I happen to know an excellent remedy for headaches. Very hands-on. Comes highly recommended.”

“Yeah?” I try to find the register we usually play this in, but it comes out flat.

Paige’s eyebrows lift, cataloging that too.

My phone buzzes against my thigh.

Milo: this is literally all your fault

I read it twice. Nothing before it, no context. It’s like he’s mid-conversation with me and I’ve missed the first half.

Me: what is

I set the phone face-down on the table and look back up at Paige, who’s watching me do all of this with the patient expression of someone who’s decided to let this play out.

The phone buzzes again before I’ve said a word to her.

Milo: im drunk

I look at that longer than I need to and don’t answer. I put the phone away, pick my fork back up, and ask Paige a question about the Milan story just to prove to both of us I can still hold a conversation.

She answers it. I don’t retain a word.

The phone goes again.

Milo: me and emily are drinking wine. lots of wine