Page 33 of Glitter

Initially, I’d wanted to ask him for advice about patenting my food dispenser. Seeing how Blue had been so enthusiastic about it on Saturday morning had made me wonder if it could be a viable side venture. Daniel owned a mixed breed dog, so I was curious to see what he would think of the idea.

But then Blue and I had gone out on our first date, and after everything he’d told me, I’d shifted my focus to asking Daniel what he thought about me giving Blue a key to my house with the goal of him moving in with me down the track.

“It’s only been, what? A weekend?” he asked, the distant sounds of cows mooing in the background.

“He’s been working at Eckersley’s for a year now.” I slowed to a stop out the front of the store I’d been looking for but didn’t enter. I wanted to finish this conversation with Daniel first.

“Yeah, so you said. Remind me how long you two have been talking to each other, though?”

I bristled. This wasn’t quite how I thought this conversation would go. I thought he’d be more supportive than this. “A few weeks.” It had actually been ten days, but I wasn’t admitting that.

“Right.” He drew the word out like he didn’t believe me. “And you went out on your first date…?”

I remained silent. I knew what he was getting at. It didn’t mean I’d play along. He was supposed to be sympathetic, damn it.

A few agonizing seconds of silence went by before, “Henry? When?”

“Yesterday,” I grumbled under my breath, low enough that I hoped he hadn’t heard it.

He let that settle for a moment, letting me know that he had, in fact, heard me. “And you don’t think that asking him to move in with you the very next day is taking things too fast.”He didn’tpose it as a question because he knew as well as I did how it sounded. In fact, he sounded disappointed.

“Look, I know how it sounds, okay?” I did. I really did. But Blue couldn’t keep living like that. If he didn’t think it was safe for me tovisit, then it certainly wasn’t safe enough for him tolivethere. “And I’m nottechnicallyasking him to move in with me. I’m—”

“Just giving him a key to your place. I know.” Daniel’s voice started echoing, so I assumed he’d moved into the barn to muck out the stalls. “It’s the same thing, Henry. How can you not see that?”

I grumbled louder, letting the sound roll around my throat before I released it. “I have a spare room. If I suddenly advertised for a roommate, you’d see nothing wrong with me getting a key cut.”

“You can run background checks on potential tenants, Henry. Don’t you dare try to compare gifting a key to your home to someone you barely know with getting a roommate.” I could almost see him standing tall with his hands on his hips, glaring at something in the barn and imagining it was my head. “How much do you know about this guy? Really, truly know about him?”

I knew how Blue looked last night when he was telling me what had happened in his past, how he expected to have me dismiss him just like every other family member and so many friends in the past, how he’d tried to make the choice for me by walking out on our date before I caught his wrist and pulled him back to me.

He was hanging on to life by a thread. And no one knew, except me. How could I turn my back on that? I understood Daniel’s concerns. I really did. But he didn’t know Blue. He didn’t know how Blue simply needed a chance to catch hisbreath. If I could give him a room to stay, even if it was only for a couple of months, wouldn’t that help?

Irritated with his logic, I sighed. “I know enough,” I said, continuing right over the top of him when I heard him scoff. “But I hear what you’re saying. If I can get references for him, would that make you feel better?”

It was his turn to grumble. “It’d be a good fucking start.”

“Fine.”

“Fine.”

We let silence reign for a few moments, letting each other settle. I could hear the scrape of his shovel against the concrete flooring in his barn, letting me know he was using his work to get his annoyance at me out of his system.

“How’s Rose?” I finally asked, figuring a change in topic wouldn’t hurt. And if there was one thing that I knew about Daniel, it was that getting him talking about his daughter was a surefire way to lighten his mood.

The scraping stopped, and he sighed, but this time it was happy rather than annoyed. “She’s doing good. So good. She’s spending the day in town volunteering at the local animal shelter. I swear that kid is going to end up being a vet or something when she grows up.”

I smiled at the delight oozing from his every word. She’d had a rough childhood before Daniel and his now ex-husband had adopted her, but with a lot of love, care, and therapy, she’d blossomed into a wonderful young girl that Daniel was beyond proud to call his daughter. I had no doubt that whatever career path she pursued in the years to come, she’d thrive, and Daniel would support her every step of the way. “Oh, yeah? Is it a full summer thing?”

“Not yet. They won’t let her do a full summer for another couple of years if she’s still interested, but they said they could take her one day every week for now. So far, she’s loving it.”

“Good on her.”

“She’s such a good kid, Hen.” The tension that had spread through my shoulders eased when he called me the nickname that he’d had for me when we were growing up. Our argument was now over and in the past. It may not be forgotten, but at least it was finished. For now. “I truly lucked out when she was put in our care.”

“Yeah, you really did,” I said, smiling softly, my eyes on the ground in front of me as I paced back and forth on the sidewalk. “You’ve done well with her, Dan. Real well.”

“You think so?” he asked quietly, lingering doubt still clear in his voice. Such was the lot of a parent, especially one who was single. If he needed reassurance, I’d be happy to provide it to him.

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