Page 27 of The Magic We Made

She is. She’s walking away from the laundry room and toward the front door, outside of which the rain is still coming down in a heavy stream. No more thunder or lightning, but the downpour is rat-a-tat-tatting against the skylights like a drumline. She pays no attention to this, however.

“Not at all! I just know you have important things to do rightnow. Weren’t you going to call Mrs. Baumgarten to let her know about her refund?”

“Yeah, but I thought I might wait for a break in the deluge before heading home.”

“Oh, it’s not that bad out there.” She’s smiling at me, which is great. But she’s also pulling open the front door. There, the sound of the rain is more of a steady roar than a rat-a-tat-tat. It sounds like Niagara Falls. “Just a little drizzle.”

“Are you kidding me right now?”

She looks at the thick curtain of rain streaming down past the overflowing gutters along the roof of her porch and bites her lower lip. “Well...”

“You can’t even see my house through that rain,” I exclaim. The only thing you can see through it is her yard, which has turned into a river of mud thanks to its lack of vegetation—or rather, any vegetation except for weeds.

“Right,” she says pleasantly. Every word out of her mouth sounds pleasant, including what she says next: “But like I said, I have patients—”

“No, you don’t.” I point to the calendar. “This says you’re done for the day. You don’t have anything crossed out after four, which means you’re free, right?”

I watch as her face falls. I can tell she’s not used to people calling her out on her shit, maybe because so few others have dared.

Well, I dare.

“Oh,” she says, looking even more uncomfortable. “I do have appointments, I just didn’t write them on that. I use electronic medical record software to—”

“Sure you do,” I say, in as pleasant a tone as she’s using. “Look, I get it. You don’t want me here. And that’s okay. I don’t want to be here either.”

This isn’t a lie. I don’t want to be here in Francesca’s living room. I want to be in her bedroom.

“But I’m not going back out there,” I say, striding over to the deep, comfortable-looking couch in front of her brick fireplace. “You know, most people would offer me a beer or something out of gratitude for helping them catch their cat.”

“I told you,” she says. “That’s not my cat. I’m going to take her to the vet tomorrow to—”

“I know, I know. To see if she has a microchip. But you wouldn’t be able to do that if I hadn’t come along when I did and used my extraordinary superpowers to lure that cat inside.”

I flop down onto the sun-faded couch. It’s clear that when it isn’t raining outside, this living room, like mine, gets a lot of light. Despite the faded color, the sofa is a good one, very soft and wide.

I sink down into the cushions and wonder if this is the same place Dr. Dick used to sit when watching TV at night. Thereisa TV in the room but it’s small and tucked into a corner, unlike the eighty-five-inch flatscreen I have hanging over the mantel next door.

“I’m more than happy to accept a glass of wine if you don’t have any beer,” I go on. “Or even whisky. I’m not picky.”

Francesca stares at me some more. I think she’s trying to give me some kind of death stare, but because she’s so beautiful, it isn’t exactly threatening.

“I’m sorry,” she says in a tone so sweet, it’s hard to tell she’s not sorry at all. “I don’t keep alcohol in the house. My ex didn’tdrink, and it’s a habit I try to avoid as well, since alcohol has no health benefits—”

This information causes me to sit up straight, even though the couch is so damned comfortable.

“Dr. Dick didn’t drink?” I exclaim.

It’s only when I see the surprised look on her face that I realize what’s just come out of my mouth.

“Dr. Dick?” Her slender eyebrows have gone up. Way up.

“Sorry.” I don’t care if I’ve offended that douche. But I care if I’ve offended her. “I mean Richard. Didn’t he go by Dick? I could have sworn that’s how he introduced himself.”

“Richard never went by Dick,” she says, looking intrigued, not offended. She’s closed the front door and crossed the room to lower herself into the faded armchair across from my couch. I know I shouldn’t be looking at her legs, but they’re right there in front of me, smooth and tanned and muscular as she crosses one over the other.

“But yes,” Francesca goes on. “Richard is very health conscious and doesn’t drink alcohol. Did he really ask you to call him Dick?”

I can’t look at her face. That dark-eyed gaze is too intense. But I can’t look at her bare legs, either. That would be rude. I decide to look at the rain streaming down the windows behind her. “He never asked me anything except not to let my knotweed creep into his yard... whatever knotweed is.”