Olive
Hey Sadie. Max gave me your number. This is Olive, btw.
Hi.
Olive
I was wondering if you’d want to get lunch with me. I think we might have more in common than you realize.
Sure, I don’t have much going on. Want to meet at The Wharf?
Olive
Sounds perfect. See you at noon?
(Thumbs up*)
She obviously doesn’t know that Max told me about what she went through last year. And why would she? Max has made it clear it’s not something that she’d want to advertise. But I feel a little awkward knowing a secret about her—a little deceptive.
Max
The silence is deafening.
Sorry, I was texting your sister-in-law. Your secrets are my secrets.
Max
Phew! They already had a whole thing going about my journal… I think my mom sent the girls' photos of it.
And you’re saying Olive has these pictures?
Max
Hilarious.
I’ll ask her to bring them to lunch.
Max
You guys are hanging out?
I promise I’ll limit conversation about our recent displays of affection… after she lets me read your deep dark secrets.
Max
What time is lunch?
Who could know? (*Smile*)
I’m not sure "displays of affection" is the right description of what happened between us last night—it was more passion-filled than loving. But affectionate isn’t a word I would associate with myself. And one I’m not sure has much of anything to do with my fate despite being the most recent answer to a clue. After Max cleaned himself up yesterday, we ordered takeout, put on a movie we didn’t watch, and spent way too much time trying to solve it.
4. Down
Heated: Demonstrative
Sliding my arm across my bed, I flip the book open to the fourth puzzle. The letters are spelled out in boxes, the gold script sunken deeply into the page. Four down, four to go. A sense of accomplishment sinks into me. I’m halfway through, halfway to figuring out what this is all supposed to mean, yet I couldn’t feel further away from deciphering it.
I’ve been doing crosswords for years and have stacks of finished puzzles in boxes that I’m saving for a rainy day—the one that will come when I have a house of my own and can frame my favorite ones. The thing that’s throwing me is that they always have a theme. Sometimes it’s broad like a day at the beach, but occasionally it’s something specific like a crossword that covers a particular sport. This one, albeit oddly easy to solve with Max, doesn’t follow a pattern that I can tell. It’s arbitrary, random words that could be classified as character traits—but traits I don’t necessarily possess.