Page 202 of Just One More Thing

I feel the ache of that.

The specific shape of their absence.

But for the first time, the ache has company.

Mo looks up and finds me across the grass. She’s wearing my hat. The black Buccaneers hat she talked me out of with three words and a look. Smiling.

I walk toward her.

She stands and meets me halfway. “You okay?”

I look at her. At the hat. At the town behind her, still lit up, still holding on to tonight like it’s something worth keeping.

“Yeah,” I say. “I’m okay. I have you, and I’m home.”

She takes my hand.

“Me too,” she says.

And for the first time in a long time, neither of us means just the town.

CHAPTER 46

JAKE

The dock is quiet when we walk down it. The town still glows behind us, but out here it’s just water, the soft creak of rope against the cleats, and us.

Mo’s hand is in mine. She hasn’t let go once.

Every few steps her thumb brushes the side of my hand, absentmindedly, and every time it happens, my chest does something stupid.

The light is on outside the boathouse. Ryan must’ve flipped it when he dropped Hank off.

I ease the door open.

Hank is asleep in the middle of the couch with his travel bag dumped beside him, bandanas spilling halfway onto the cushion like he personally supervised the unpacking and then emotionally clocked out before completion.

One paw twitches in his sleep.

Probably chasing French Fry.

Mo kicks off her shoes by the door. They land beside mine on the mat.

Two pairs of shoes.

That’s it.

That tiny thing changes the whole room.

She walks into the kitchen without hesitation. Fills her bkr from the sink and drinks from it, leaning against the counter, one hip cocked, completely at ease. Then she opens the window and the night air rolls in carrying salt and the distant hum of town life.

The boathouse already sounds different. Feels different.

Fuller.

She sets the Buccaneers hat beside my keys. Her bkr bottle next to my glass.

Small things.