Page 28 of Just One More Thing

“No.”

“Every time.”

I point the hot dog at him. “I think you’re making that up.”

He shakes his head, smiling now. “Nope.”

Hank bumps my calf. He’s laughing too.

“Rude,” I mumble to both of them.

We keep walking. The buoy dings out on the water. A seagull circles overhead, and I swear it’s the same one that’s been showing up all week. French Fry. An airborne menace. Hank notices him too and lets out a low growl.

We pass Willard’s bench.

He’s exactly as he always is. Hat low, peanut bag within reach, Chip somewhere close even when I can’t see him.

“You still do that thing where you eat around the best part and save it for last?”

I stop and look at him. “That is such a vague accusation.”

“It’s not vague. It’s specific.” He gestures at my tray. “You did it with your Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups too.”

“Oh my God.” I laugh, horrified. “Why do you remember everything embarrassing about me?”

“Mo, I remember all of it.”

Jake laughs beside me. His eyes stay on mine long enough to make me feel the difference between someone remembering your hot dog habits and someone who never really stopped.

Once we pass the lighthouse, I glance up and catch faces in windows.

Three people at Town Hall stacked one above the other, building a human periscope. Somebody across The Green holding a paperback upside down and not even pretending to read it.

Mrs. Kravitz lifting her coffee at us, toasting the show.

“You okay?” Jake asks quietly.

Of course he catches it. Jake has always known me, often better than I know myself.

“Am I imagining this,” I ask, “or is half the town pretending not to stare at us?”

He glances toward Town Hall. Hart’s Landing. Mrs. Kravitz, who raises her cup again with absolutely no shame.

“No,” he says. “That’s pretty much what’s happening.”

“Great. I didn’t realize how public this would feel.”

Jake is quiet for a second. “It always was,” he says.

I glance at him.

He gives one small shrug. “We just didn’t notice when we were kids.”

And he’s right. Nothing about us was ever private here. We just had the advantage of being too young to understand what that meant yet.

I look toward Tall Tales, and somebody straight up ducks behind the glass. I almost laugh.

Jake reaches over and takes my tray from me.