Page 142 of IRL: In Real Life
Or I hoped there wasn’t.
The truth was, Nicole was happy and well cared for. We just missed her during the holidays.
Micah watched me quietly. “Damn.”
“Yeah, so I have to catch her in between the in-betweens. But I suppose I get it. Marriage is a partnership.”
“It is, but it doesn’t mean you don’t miss the ones caught up in one.”
“That too.”
I shook my head and looked out over the city for a second, then back at him.
“Speaking of Labor Day,” I said carefully, “you have any plans?”
His eyes lifted.
“Depends.”
“On?”
“Who’s asking?”
I cut my eyes at him over the rim of my glass. “I am.”
He sat back in his chair and looked at me fully. “What you got in mind?”
“My parents are doing the usual,” I said. “Food. Deck. My father pretending he’s not showing off at the grill. My mother being the one who brings it all together. Family. Noise.” I glanced down at my drink, then back up. “You can come, if you want.”
The second the words were out, I felt how much they meant.
It wasn’t just food.
Not to me.
It was my people.My world.
The place I went when I needed noise and softness and the kind of belonging that predated all the versions of myself I had built for everybody else.
Micah understood that too. I could see it in the way his face lost some of its teasing.
“You serious?” he asked.
“Why would I say it if I wasn’t?”
That made his mouth shift.
“I’d love to meet your family.”
We ordered food after that. Shared truffle fries because he acted like he wasn’t hungry until mine came and suddenly my plate was public property. He kept one hand low at the back ofmy chair or brushing my bare knee under the table just often enough to stay in my body.
I liked that too much, which was exactly where the night was sitting when I heard his name and looked up to see Bryce and his scraggly locs coming toward us with that same easy smile he always wore, like every room was already open to him if he stepped into it with enough confidence.
“Well, damn,” he said. “The Link Up really be outside.”
Micah laughed and clasped his hand. “What’s good?”
Bryce, and the locs he should go on and cut off looked at me next. “Talia.”
