Page 62 of Just One More Thing

“I don’t brood.”

She laughs. “Sure you don’t.”

“I don’t.”

“Mm-hmm.”

“Bethany.”

She glances back.

“Thanks,” I say.

“I know.”

Then she’s gone.

Hank lumbers out from under the stool and flops against my leg with a grunt, like he’s had a long, exhausting night of doing absolutely nothing.

I scratch the loose skin at the back of his neck. “You did great tonight.” He leans heavier.

I kill the overhead lights and step outside. The air’s cooler now. The dock’s quiet. No music. No laughter drifting out over the bay. Just the soft slap of water against wood.

I lean on the railing. Hank plants himself on my foot. For a minute, I listen to the water under the dock with my bulldog on my foot and don’t chase a single thought.

She shows up anyway.

I can still hear her laughing in the dunk tank, head tipped back, soaked through and forgetting to be mad at me. I still feel the weight of her sliding into me when we hit that wave and didn’t move right away.

The way her eyes lifted to mine like she was already halfway there before she stopped herself.

“She leaned in,” I tell Hank. He blinks up at me. “I felt it.”

I didn’t imagine it.

I reach over and flip off the last dock light. Across the water, a light clicks on above Holey Moley. Second floor. Her room.

Don’t look.

I look.

Just long enough to let it be real that she’s over there and I’m over here and the stretch of water between us isn’t as wide as it used to be.

I push off the railing and turn toward the boathouse. Hank’s nails click beside me on the planks.

If she walks toward me, I’ll be here.

And if she doesn’t?—

I keep walking.

What scares me is the hope she will.

CHAPTER 18

EMORY

The doughnuts are done. The glaze is setting in glossy silence.