Page 58 of Counting the Days

“By the way, I hope you know I didnotexpect you to make me lemonade. It just tasted so fresh, I thought—”

“Honestly, the fact that you assumed I knew how to make lemonade was a huge compliment.”

Danny looked relieved. She was beginning to wonder if he was as neurotic as she was; the thought made her feel significantly less alone in the world. She felt herself relaxing; the adrenaline rush had finally subsided.

“Well, I think I can officially say, the sex was earth-shattering,” she said with her mouth full of chow mein.

Danny laughed. “Are you saying I rocked your world?”

“I’m saying you rockedtheworld.”

Danny shook his head and said, “Man…I really do like you so much.”

“Likeme so much? Uh-oh. Have I been downgraded?”

“What? No. No way. I just don’t wanna, you know, say that too much or you’ll be like,enough already.”

“Say what too much?” She looked innocently up at him through her eyelashes.

He laughed through his nose and put the kung pao tofu on the coffee table.

“I love you,” he said earnestly, then sighed and added, “I do, though. I really do.”

She moved across the couch toward him and climbed onto his lap, wrapping her legs around his torso. He looked into her eyes as he slowly untied her bathrobe and slid it off her shoulders.

“I love you too,” she said.

As he kissed her neck, she envisioned their joint burial in a side-by-side companion plot, their bodies six feet under one lone headstone:Here Lie Two People Who Loved Each Other. She had no choice; that would have to be enough.

215Days

Rhea walked into Zoe’s housearmed with a wrapped gift in one hand and a boyfriend in the other.

The day before, when Danny was driving Rhea home, he received a work call. He looked at Rhea apologetically and said, “We’ve been playing phone tag, so I’m gonna grab this, but I’ll make it quick.”

Rhea smiled and said, “Of course,” excited to see Danny work; watching him be a business owner had become foreplay.

He answered the call, listened politely for a moment, then said, “Hey, can I actually call you back in a few minutes? I’m just dropping my girlfriend off.”

Rhea froze and held her breath. The wordgirlfriendhad slipped out of his mouth so effortlessly she was not sure he knew he’d said it. She snuck a glance at him, and a microscopic upturn of his lip gave him away.

“So…I, uh, just called you my girlfriend.”

“Uh-huh…”

“It was an accident—but…how do we feel about that word?”

“Welovethat word.”

They walked briskly up fifty-two steps and reconsummated their relationship for an hour. Danny made an extremely apologetic work call on his drive home.

The following day, as Rhea and Danny entered Zoe’s living room, Rhea leaned over to Danny and whispered, “I’m about to usethat worda bunch, so buckle up.”

“Do you wanna do a practice run?” he asked.

“Hello, this is myboyfriend,Danny.”

“You’re putting a little too much mustard on it. Just let it roll off your tongue. Real casual.”