We’re ten minutes into a break—coffee going cold, someone’s box of pastries open on an amp—when I put the phone down and catch the whole band looking at me.
“You’re in a good mood.” Jeremy says.
“Good session with great people.”
“Awww, thanks Rhonda.” Ana says.
The burger place is exactly the kind of place Lena would love—vinyl booths, a specials board in three colours of marker, a grillyou can hear from the street. She’s already in a booth when I walk in, and she stands up too fast when she sees me, smiling ear to ear. Then she hugs me—quick and fierce, both arms, up on her toes—and I get a full hit of that perfume again, bergamot and amber, warm vanilla and a curl of sandalwood, and she’s soft against me. Something in my shoulders I didn’t know I’d been holding lets go.
“Okay, I’ve been waiting for this all week,” she says, before I’ve even sat down. “You order the special, you get a milkshake and the fries.”
“Yes mam.” I say.
“Be ready for the time of your life.”
“I feel you’re more eager than I am.”
I ordered the special. I got the milkshake. She watches me take the first bite.
“Well?”
“It’s not bad.” I chew, looking back at her. “It’s alright.”
“What? Tell me the truth.”
“It’s the best thing I’ve eaten in months.”
“I knew it!”
She’s so pleased I have to study the table.
We split a basket of fries and a pitcher of something local, and two hours go somewhere I don’t track.
“So there’s a new guy at work,” she says. “Gerald. He’s a new contractor that’s going to work with us till the end of the year. It’s a bit weird but this guy smiles and looks at me constantly.”
“Oh. Really?”
I feel like the burger doesn’t taste so good anymore.
“He does it all day even when I’m not looking, and with teeth. He taps my monitor when he talks to me.”
I don’t love the feeling that arrives with that information. It’s small and hot and unfamiliar. I take a long drink.
“He taps your monitor. Ew.”
“Are you—” She sets down a fry and stares at me, delighted. “Are you okay?”
“Nothing’s wrong.”
“You’re doing a face.”
“I’m not. He just sounds weird that’s all.”
“Mhmm.” She smiles.
To change the subject I tell her about Sandy and the onion and the guitar case, again, because she likes the story and I like watching her lose it laughing.
Her apartment is the same small warm shape I remember, except this time I come in like I’ve done it before. She hands me the blanket—the couch blanket, worn soft at the edges—and it should feel like the night I was sick here, and it doesn’t. I know her name now. I know the exact laugh she makes when something catches her sideways.