Page 31 of Brother in Law with Benefits

My chest tightens. "Grant—"

"I know. Not here." He's still looking at his screen. "But I needed you to know that. Three days and I haven't stopped."

I don't respond. Can't. Because the same is true for me. I've caught myself reaching for my phone a dozen times a day to text him something small and stupid, a joke about a patient, a complaint about hospital coffee, and stopping myself every time, and if I say it out loud we'll be back in the conversation we agreed not to have yet.

Patty stirs and opens one eye. "You're both terrible liars," she says groggily, and closes it again.

***

Thursday arrives at the speed of a calendar that is personally invested in my discomfort.

I show up at six with wine, which feels slightly absurd given the situation but is nonetheless correct behavior. Grant answers the door.

"Hey," he says.

"Hey."

We stand in the doorway for a beat too long until Patty calls from the kitchen, and Grant steps aside, and our arms brush when I walk past him. That brief contact does things I'm trying to manage.

This is going to be a long dinner.

It is, in fact, a long dinner, and also a perfect one. Patty's lasagna is as good as I remembered. We sit at the kitchen table where I used to have Sunday dinners when I was married to Chris, and it feels different now — the chair I'm in, the space, the company. Better. Which is information I'm not examining during dinner.

Grant is quiet. He eats and drinks his wine and watches me when he thinks I'm not looking, and every time I catch him at it something in my chest does a small, undisciplined flip that I've stopped being able to suppress, three days of careful distance apparently no match for the man sitting across a plate of lasagna from me like I'm the only interesting thing in the room.

I am always looking.

After dinner, I help with dishes. Grant takes out the trash. Patty supervises from her chair.

"You two are being weird," she says.

"We're not—"

"Sophie. I've known you for six years." She studies me. "Is this about the leaving?"

I dry a plate with more focus than it requires. "He's leaving in eight weeks. I'm staying here. That's all."

"That doesn't have to be all."

"Yes, it does." I set the plate down. "Patty, I can't — you're his mother. I don't want to put you in the middle of whatever this is."

"You're not putting me anywhere." She stands and crosses to me, takes my hands. "I'm choosing to be here. For both of you." She squeezes. "I know my son is scared. I know he's spent twenty years running from anything that looks permanent. But he cares about you. More than he's letting himself admit."

"That doesn't change the fact that he's leaving."

"Not if he chooses to stay."

Grant comes back in. Looks between us with the expression of a man who has walked in on something and is deciding whether to walk back out.

Patty pats my shoulder. "I'm going upstairs to watch my show. The porch is nice this time of evening." She walks past Grant. "Talk to her."

Grant and I stand in the kitchen in the silence she leaves behind.

"Porch?" he says.

"Yeah. Okay."

The porch swing. Where we had our first real conversation. The sky is orange and pink, and the neighborhood sounds are normal and unhurried.