Page 154 of Safe With You

“What’d you do?” Naomi asked.

“Put the camera down.”

“And?”

“He smiled.”

I laughed. “Of course he did.”

“So I picked it back up.”

“He cried again,” Mila said, already grinning.

Ellis looked at her. “You weren’t there.”

“You told me.”

“I tell you too much.”

She giggled.

“We spent almost an hour doing that. Camera up, tears. Camera down, happiest kid in Mississippi.”

“You cried too,” Mila added.

Ellis paused. “I did not.”

“You did.”

“I was frustrated.”

Mila turned toward me. “He made this face.”

She pulled her eyebrows together and pushed her bottom lip out, doing such an exaggerated impression that my laugh came out before I could stop it.

“I do not look like that.”

“You kind of do,” I said.

His head turned toward me. “I thought you were on my side.”

“I was.”

“And?”

I shrugged. “I changed my mind.”

“Traitor.”

“I prefer observant.”

“Of course you do.”

The smile stayed on his face when he reached for his drink.

Eventually, the cookies disappeared and our drinks were mostly ice. Mila slid down from her chair and wandered back toward the children’s section with the book she’d left open earlier.

Naomi gathered the trash from the table.