Page 62 of Rise
“You make a mean cup of coffee,” she murmured, grinning around the rim as her eyes lifted to his.
Beck huffed a soft laugh and looked down, shaking his head. But when his eyes lifted again, they met hers with something warm behind them.
Neither of them spoke for a while after that, but the silence wasn’t empty.
By the time the toast was gone, just a few soft crumbs left behind on the plate, Beck pushed away from the island with a quiet exhale and rolled his shoulders back. He stepped out of the kitchen and toward the front door, pausing to crouch down as he reached for his boots. A low sound escaped him as he bent, half-groan, half-sigh. It was the kind of sound that came from a body that had worked hard. One that carried weight without complaint.
“I’m gonna clean up a bit outside,” he said, tugging the laces tight with practiced ease. “Then I can take you home.”
Hazel nodded. “Okay.”
But her voice was soft; thinner than she meant it to be.
Beck glanced at her, just a flicker of a look over his shoulder, like he could feel something shifting between them again, but he didn’t comment. He stood, pulled on his jacket, and stepped outside.
The door clicked closed behind him.
And the quiet that followed was somehow louder than before.
Hazel let her fingers rest on the edge of the plate, then drew them back, tucking her hands into the sleeves of his sweater. The cuffs fell past her wrists. She folded them once, absentmindedly, and exhaled through her nose.
After a beat, she reached for her phone, pulled from the waistband pocket of her leggings. Two notifications from Iris lit the screen.
The air smells like moss and pine and rain. I need avocado toast immediately.
Thank the heavens you close the bakery on Sundays! Fork & Fable at 11?
Hazel smiled, the expression tugging something loose in her chest.
She stood, sliding the phone into her hand, and made her way towards the wall of windows at the back of the house. Through the glass, she could just make out the blur of movement near the trees— the shape of Beck shifting debris, dragging limbs towards the edge of the clearing.
After sliding her feet into her boots and her phone back into her pocket, Hazel opened the front door and stepped out onto the porch. The wood beneath her feet was slick and dark from the storm, water pooled in the shallow spaces between planks. The air was crisp and clean, tinged with the scent of damp cedar and soil, just as Iris’s message had said.
She spotted Beck a short distance away, half-shadowed by the trees. He was bent at the waist, hauling a thick branch toward a growing pile near the treeline, his movements steady and sure. The morning light caught on the sweat at his brow, dampening the collar of his shirt, the sleeves of his jacket pushed high up his forearms like always.
Hazel stepped down off the porch and into the gravel, her boots landing with a quiet thud.
“Hey,” she called out, her voice soft but clear.
Beck looked up, one hand braced on his knee.
“Would it be okay if you dropped me at Fork & Fable instead of home?” she asked. “Iris is demanding brunch. There’s no rush, though. She wants to meet at 11.”
He straightened and nodded once. “Yeah, of course.”
Hazel hesitated for only a second before she crossed the space that separated them. The air was cold enough to make her cheeks flush, but it felt good— like she’d finally stepped out of something heavy and into something open. Grounded.
Without asking, she reached down and picked up a branch near his feet— small enough to manage, heavy enough to require effort— and carried it toward the pile he’d started. As she bent, the bandage wrapped around her thigh stretched, but there was no real pain, just a dull ache, reminding her it was there.
Beck didn’t say anything. He just glanced at her once, a quiet flicker of acknowledgment, and moved to gather the next piece.
They worked like that for a while, quiet and methodical. It was the kind of shared labour that didn’t need filling with words. Hazel’s fingers ached a little from the cold as she stacked branches beside his, stepping carefully over the uneven ground, pine needles slick beneath her soles.
Somewhere in the trees, a bird called out. The clouds were beginning to lift.
By the time they climbed into Beck’s truck a while later, the time on the dash read 10:49. Hazel settled into the passenger seat, brushing dark hair from her face, the warmth of the cabin still clinging faintly to her sweater.Hissweater.
Beck started the engine, the low rumble filling the silence between them.
