Page 40 of Tempted By the Safety

“Dean,” Milo says. “No.”

He says it before Dean’s even fully finished, quiet, no heat in it, and I keep my mouth shut and my eyes on my coffee, because this one is not mine to referee.

“It’s not like before,” Dean says. “This is a job, Milo, this isn’t—”

“I know what it is.” Milo sets his fork down. “And I’m not giving you the four hundred.”

The table goes quiet.

“Listen, I love you,” Milo continues. “But I’m done financing you like that. It’s not helping you, Dean, it’s just letting you keep doing this again and again, and I can’t… I won’t do it anymore.”

“I’m not asking you to bail me out again or anything, I’m asking for a permit fee—”

“I know. And it’s still no.” Milo doesn’t look away from him. “If you want the job, get the job. Figure out the fee. I’ll help you look at what’s actually out there. I’ll sit with you and figure out what the permit and the class actually cost. I’ll even call the guy myself and ask if there’s a payment plan on the class. That kind of help.”

Dean looks at him for a long second, jaw working.

“Fine,” he says finally, and picks his fork back up like the conversation’s already old news. “I’ll think about it. The sitting-down thing.”

“Okay,” Milo says.

Mrs. Shaw is watching all of this over the rim of her coffee mug.

“Well,” she sets the mug down. “Now that that’s out of the way, Milo, tell me about this new job of yours.”

Milo straightens up, and his face loosens. “I got into an apprenticeship. Pastry, at a place in the West Village. Real kitchen, real chef, the whole thing. I started two weeks ago.”

Mrs. Shaw’s hand comes up to her mouth, and for a second I think she’s going to cry before she laughs instead, swatting at the table. “You’re kidding me. You’re not kidding me?”

“Not kidding.”

“Honey, that’s amazing!”

“It’s just an apprenticeship,” Milo says, though he’s smiling now. “I’m basically laminating dough and getting yelled at in French. And it’s all thanks to Spencer. He pushed me to try for it.”

“You give me too much credit,” I say.

“Yeah, but you pushed me. I had the idea parked in a drawer somewhere labeledsomeday, and you’re the one who told me to go call the guy.”

“I told you just once. You’re the one who called him back after he said no the first time, and called him again after that, and showed up to ask him for a trial shift. That’s all you, finally doing the thing you always wanted to do.”

Mrs. Shaw looks between us. “Look at you two,” she says, and then turns to me. “I’ve been waiting a long time for him to find somebody like you.”

I say thank you, which isn’t the right size for what she just handed me, but it’s what I’ve got. Milo reaches under the table and puts his hand on my knee, and leaves it there.

After, Mrs. Shaw won’t let Milo or Dean near the sink, but she doesn’t say a word when I stand up and start running water. Milo tries to argue for about four seconds before Dean pulls him toward the living room to look at something on his phone.

So it’s me and Mrs. Shaw in a kitchen the size of my walk-in closet, her drying while I wash, and she talks the entire time, stories stacking up one after another. Milo at nine, refusing to eat anything that wasn’t a specific shade of golden brown. Milo at fourteen, saving up three months of allowance to buy a stand mixer off a neighbor, and carrying it up several flights by himself because he wouldn’t let anyone help. Milo learning to make hisgrandmother’s bread, burning four loaves before he got the fifth one right.

I hand her plates, she dries them and stacks them in the cabinet, and there’s a rhythm to it that doesn’t require either of us to think too hard. I stand at a strange sink in a strange kitchen, scrubbing at a pot that’s seen decades of Sunday dinners, and I haven’t felt like this since before my mother passed.

“Even as a kid,” Mrs. Shaw says, quieter, drying the same plate a beat longer than she needs to, “you’d try to help him with something and he’d take it out of your hands and say he’s got it, don’t worry, he’s got it.” She looks over at me. “So whatever you’re doing. Keep doing it.”

I don’t have an answer, so I nod.

By the time we say our goodbyes at the door, Mrs. Shaw is hugging me and telling me to come back soon and bring my appetite. I’ve got a container of leftovers in one hand and Milo’s in the other.

The drive home is quiet at first, city lights sliding past the windows, Milo with his head tipped against the seat, watching them go.