“Nothing’s the matter. We’ve done this conversation already. Like, word for word done it.”
“It’s not done if you don’t answer the question.”
“I did answer the question.”
“No, you bullshitted me. That’s not the same thing.”
“Oh, you mean like you pretending you’re paying a friendly visit, when actually you’re just checking I’m still available to drive your flowers all over the county on Saturday?”
“Why are you being an arsehole?”
“I’m not.”
Mia’s temper was a hair-trigger. I had one more shot at reasonable conversation before she kicked me in the dick, but my survival instinct was at an all-time low. As in, if she punched me in the nuts, at least I’d have something else to focus on.
But before I could meet my maker, Billy stepped between us. He reached into the van and put the spade in its rightful place, tethered to the rack, so it wouldn’t fly around and break everything. I was, as ever, transfixed by every part of him—his elegant neck, the messy hair that was starting to curl at the back, the golden glow that had started to kiss his shoulders.
I wanted to kiss his shoulders.
Mia stared at me like she knew. Like she could read my every thought, and hear the stampede of my heart.
Billy ignored the pair of us and straightened up. I waited for him to walk away. But he didn’t. He turned to face me and slogged me playfully in the ribs. “Your omelettes are as shit as mine. Fuck it, let’s go eat Mia’s.”
I prepared myself for a verbatim rerun of the last time we’d tried eating with Luke and Billy in the same room, but the weather—and Luke—saved the day. He’d built a fire in his garden, complete with firewood he was hacking with his own axe, and it turned out to be Billy’s idea of a theme park. No omelettes in sight.
Mia gave them a box of barbecue meat to fuss over, dragged me inside, and shut the door behind us. “It’s almost like giving the kids a paddling pool, and it’s the only day of the year they don’t fight.”
“You tried to drown me in the paddling pool once.”
She couldn’t deny it. For that entire summer, it had been her standard reaction to not getting her own way. She was less murderous these days, but only just. “It’s nice to see them actually speaking to each other,” she conceded and pushed a bag of lettuce towards me. “You know it keeps Luke up at night that he can’t fix everything by scowling at it.”
“Does it?”
“Yes. And if you don’t know that, you should. You’re his best friend. Where have you been the last few months?”
It was on the tip of my tongue to ask her where she’d been the five years she’d left me in Rushmere by my sad self, but I swallowed it down. There’d been four of us grieving one way or another, and we’d all dealt with it differently. Perhaps sheltering in place was my standard MO, while her and Luke took flight. I didn’t know how to define Billy.
I chopped lettuce while Mia talked at me about Luke, Billy, and everything in between. The patio doors were behind her, and I couldn’t help tracking Billy as he moved around the garden, fetching wood and helping Luke build a bench from an old pallet. Sometimes he was so transparent I could gauge his mood from the back of his head, but others, like now, he was impossible to read. However hard I stared at him, I couldn’t figure out if he was enjoying Luke’s quiet company, or if he was about to explode.
“Earth to Gus?” Mia snapped her fingers in front of my face. “Why are you gawping at Billy like you’ve never seen him before?”
“Hmm?”
“Billy. You’re staring at him. Why?”
“I’m not staring at him.”
“You really are. Something you want to tell me?”
“Like what?”
“Like why you’ve been MIA since he moved in with you, and why you’re eyeing him up like you want to eat him.”
“I’m—”
Mia’s gaze cut me short. If I’d thought she’d read my mind before, there was no doubt that she had now. Suspicion had turned to certainty, and she was on to me.
“It’s just...harder than I thought it would be to live with him.”