Page 16 of Love Notes

“Who cooks for you?”the barred owl asked, and Adam’s smile broke the kiss.

He laughed softly against my shoulder before drawing back.“Who cooks for you all?”he asked along with the owl.He threaded his fingers through mine and squeezed.“Thank you for teaching me that.”

“Thank you for dinner.”

“You can cook for me next time.”There was both a challenge and a question in the way he lifted his chin.

“Okay,” I said.“I’m not much of a cook, though.”

“Well, I’m not much of an epicure,” he said.“So that works out perfectly.Honestly, frozen pizza from the grocery store is fine by me.”

“I think I can probably do better than that.”

“Then it’s a date,” he said, rising from the swing.

I stood as well.“Do you want a hand to clean up?”

“Nope,” he said.“I have a thorny plot point to figure out.”He laughed at my expression.“Trust me, it’ll help unstick the gears in my brain.”

“Okay.If you’re sure.”

“I am,” he said.“Oh, but wait here just a second.”He carried our plates inside, leaving the door open behind him.Warm light spilled out from inside.Adam was back a moment later, holding a book.It was too dark to be sure, but I thought it might have been one I’d seen on my coffee table earlier.He pressed it into my hands.“No pressure,” he said, “but let me know what you think, okay?”

My chest squeezed, and my gut swooped as though the ground had suddenly dropped out from underneath me.I was six years old again.I was ten.I was twelve.I was an entire montage of my unhappy school days, feeling every set of eyes in the classroom on me after a teacher called my name, the first sharp claws of panic digging into me.

“No pressure,” Adam said again.“See you tomorrow?”

“Yeah,” I said, clutching the book to my aching chest.“See you tomorrow.”

And I turned and stepped off the porch into the darkness before he could tell there was anything wrong.

“YOU’RE SMILING,” ANITAsaid on our scheduled weekly Zoom call.

“And you’re in space surrounded by flying cats with laser eyes,” I said, squinting at my laptop.

“My kid changed my background again,” she said.“Just ignore it.”

“It’s actually wildly distracting.”

“And you’re avoiding the question.”

I leaned back on the couch.“What question?You didn’t ask me anything.”

“It was implied,” she said, raising a single eyebrow in a way I’d always envied.“You’re smiling.I’m suspicious.What’s going on?You’d better be about to tell me you have some new chapters for me.”

“I’m not about to tell you that,” I said.“But on the plus side, being here at Harmony Lake has really put me in the right headspace to smash this novel out!”

“And have you?”

“No,” I said.“But I am in the right headspace to do it.Any time now.”

Anita looked unimpressed.

“Two chapters by next week,” I said.“I swear.”

“Two chapters,” she agreed.“Now, are you going to tell me what you’re so happy about?”

“Nope,” I said, thinking of last night’s kiss and smiling again.

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