Page 48 of This

“I can’t believe how close you’ll be,” she says. “I can drive to see you whenever I want.”

I smile, taping the first set of flaps shut. “I can’t wait.”

“Are you sure you don’t want me to fly in and ride with you? I hate you driving so far alone again.”

Another thousand-mile trip, only this time will be a little different.

“Actually…” I hesitate, stretching another line of tape across the box. “I won’t be alone. Dane’s going to be with me.”

I brace myself for the squeal of all squeals, but it never comes. She doesn’t say anything. One second passes, two, three, four.

“Keats?”

A rush of breath comes through the speaker. “God,finally! I thought you were never going to say anything.”

“What?” I drop on the bed, bumping the box off and not trying to stop it. “You knew?”

“Since the engagement dinner.”

I sigh and hide my face in my hands. “Liam told you?”

“Only after I asked him. I mean, it wasn’t hard to put together, Bennie. Dane popped out of the house with one more button done than when he showed up, and you looked guilty as sin.”

“How have you not said anything?”

Keaton can barely contain herself when I go out with the same guy twice, let alone seeing someone exclusively for close to six months.

I sit up, glad I’m not holding the phone or I’d drop it. Six months.Is that right?

“I didn’t want you to spook,” she says, but I’m barely paying attention, counting months in my head.

Each person has their moment in a relationship—whether they recognize it or not—that changes the way they perceive it. For some, it comes with a specific milestone, the first holiday spent together or when they stop feeling the nagging need to only be seen in full makeup with a fresh blowout. They either want more from the other person or less of them. My moment hits at the six-month mark and is always the second option. Or it has been. I wait for the realization to crawl up and lodge in my throat, except nothing happens. No panic. No urge to delete Dane from my life.

If anything, I miss him more than a second ago.

I force myself to the closet before I overanalyze my lack of a freak-out and, therefore, freak out.

“Forgive me?” I ask Keaton.

She hums it over for the sake of drama. “Only if you promise not to hide any other love affairs from me.”

“I’ll shove all future ones in your face.”

“Oh,” she says, “speaking of stealth missions, I found a frog in one of my first graders’ backpacks today.”

“Ew.” As gross as the change of topic, at least she’s attempting to avoid berating me with Dane questions—Liam’s influence, no doubt. I pull the hangers off the rod and carry them to the bed. “Dead or alive?”

“Dead. Or so I thought.”

By the time she finishes her harrowing tale of the Jesus frog, I’ve finished packing. The only things left are what I need to survive the next few days and the clown painting screwed into the wall. She looks less sad today, the bright colors at the bottom lightening her mood. And mine.

Later, I’m cross-legged on the bed with my phone on my lap when Steve pokes his head in long enough to say, “Remind him he owes me twenty bucks from last week’s game.”

“You just assume I’m texting Dane,” I call after him.

“Nope.” His voice drifts in from the hallway, heading toward his tower. “I know you are.”

I am, and I smile at the message he sent before Steve’s interruption.

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