Chapter Twelve
Evan
Molly sits across from me in the split-vinyl booth, arms folded like she’s holding herself together by force.
There’s almost enough room between her and the table for a confession to slip through.
The lighting in this place is unkind — it stains her hair the color of blood oranges and pools under her cheekbones, carving shadows into something sly and mean.
She keeps her chin tipped up, eyes flicking everywhere but my face.
The effect should be defensive, but on Molly it’s a dare: try to get through me.
And despite the lighting and the mean-mugging, she still looks damn beautiful.
The waitress appears with Molly’s order of fries, the kind that slouch under a blanket of orange cheese and jalapeno, and drops the basket like she’s slapping down a gauntlet.
“Enjoy your date,” she says, chipper, all teeth.
Then she gives Molly a wink too blatant to be friendly and returns to her station.
Molly’s cheeks go hot, with blotchy red spreading up her neck. She blinks hard, like she’s trying to will away the reaction. She drags her gaze over my face like she’s checking that I’m real, and then she exhales through her nose.
“Okay,” she says.
“Okay, what?”
“Okay… I did the drink.” She taps the table once, as if she’s stamping a receipt. “You got your thank-you. I’m going to finish my fries and then get the hell out of here.”
There’s a pause, but I don’t let it linger. “That’s not why I’m here,” I say, and it comes out softer than I meant. Probably too soft.
Her eyes go laser-sharp. “Then why are you here, Evan?”
The way she says my name hits me somewhere old. Somewhere filled with memories of high school hallways, pep rally noise, and the bleachers behind the gym where she pressed me back with her hands in my shirt and kissed me like she didn’t care who saw.
We were eighteen. We made out like the world was ending. We didn’t know it wouldn’t last. Everything seemed forever back then.
I clear my throat and keep my face steady. “Because I like being around you.”
Molly’s mouth twitches like she’s offended by the softness of that answer.
“Don’t,” she says.
“Don’t what?”
“Don’t talk like that.” She gestures between us. “Like there’s… whatever this is.”
I lift my glass. “But there is.”
Her stare turns lethal. “I said one drink.”
“And we’re having one drink.”
Molly’s eyes drop — just briefly — to my mouth, then snap back up. She looks annoyed at herself for it.
“You’re enjoying this,” she says.
“Yes. I’m also enjoying you trying to pretend you’re not enjoying it.”
She makes a small sound, half scoff, half laugh, as if it slipped out against her will. “God. You’re still like this.”
I lift an eyebrow. “Still like what?”
“Like you know exactly how to get under my skin.” Her fingers tighten around her glass. “Like you walk in here and act normal and…” She stops. Her jaw sets. “Why are you here? Why are you back in Ironwood Falls?”
There it is. The real question.
Not ‘where have you been?’
Not ‘who are you, really?’
Just… Why?
I keep my posture easy, but something inside me goes taut.
“I’m working,” I say.
That’s not enough for her. “You’re working,” she repeats, slow and skeptical. “In Ironwood Falls. After all this time, you’re just… working.”
I nod. “Yeah.”
She lets out a low whistle and shakes her head. “You disappeared. You know that, right? Like, rumor had it you were dead, or in prison, or on the run. Nobody just leaves unless they have a reason, Evan.”
I look down at the table, tapping a small rhythm with my thumb against the glass. “It wasn’t exactly a choice.”
Her eyes flicker, something almost like sympathy passing over them. “Then tell me what it was.”
“My parents died.”
The words land like a body hitting pavement. The booth goes silent, the diner around us suddenly muted, like the world has braced itself for the echo.
Molly’s expression softens; her lips part, and she forgets her irritation for a second.
“How?” she says, her voice a notch quieter.
“Car accident,” I say. The words come out flat because if I let them come out real, I’ll crack. “It happened not long after that night we almost…”
Molly’s throat bobs. “Jesus.”
I nod once. “It happened out of state. They were on a trip. After that, it was just me and June.”
Her eyes soften at the name. “Your sister.”
“Yeah.”
“How old was she?”
The memory of June at that age — scrawny and brittle, wary of everything — makes my chest hurt.
“Eleven,” I say. “She just turned eleven.”
Molly closes her eyes for a second and lets the information settle. “Fuck.”
“She was a kid,” I say, firmer. “And I had to become… everything. Overnight.”
Molly’s fingers curl around her coffee mug like she needs the warmth. “So you left.”
“We left,” I say. “I know I didn’t handle everything right…
I didn’t know what to do. I mean, suddenly, I was all June had and had to figure life out for us both.
I made a lot of mistakes. I know there were people I should’ve told or things I could’ve done better, but, fuck, I was so scared.
After mom and dad died, I needed a lot of help…
We went up north. Stayed with some relatives outside of Seattle.
I got work where I could. Money was tight, so I did what I had to do. ”
She’s quiet, but she’s watching me, and I can tell she’s reconstructing the silhouette of my past, patching in the holes with the things I never told her.
“And now you’re back,” she says, finally.
“I’m back.”
“Why?” Her eyes lock on mine. “Don’t give me a Hallmark answer.”
I almost laugh. Almost. Instead, I give her as much as I think I can.
“Work brought me here. Contracting, mostly — fixing things. Small jobs. Repairs.”
Molly’s gaze drops to my hands. My knuckles. The faint old scars that don’t match ‘normal guy in a beige sedan.’
“Fixing things,” she says, as if she’s tasting the lie.
“Jack of all trades,” I say. “Mostly small jobs. Sometimes it’s plumbing, sometimes patching drywall, sometimes people call me when their porch starts to sag and they don’t want to pay union rates. I move around a lot, pick up what I can. I’m not picky.”
“And June?” she says.
My chest tightens. “June’s my priority.”
Molly’s lashes lower. “Still?”
“Always.”
Something shifts in her face — softens, opens. The suspicion doesn’t vanish, but it loosens enough for something else to slip through.
Respect.
Maybe even… attraction.
“You’re a caretaker,” she says, as if she doesn’t mean to say it out loud.
I keep my voice light. “Is that a compliment or an insult?”
“Depends on the man.”
I take a slow sip of my drink. “And what about me?”
She looks away first, which tells me everything I need to know. Molly doesn’t retreat from men she’s indifferent to.
She retreats from men who might matter.
“It means that I don’t do… complicated,” she says.
“You’re the one who brought up the past,” I say.
Her eyes snap back. “You showed up in my building.”
“And you ran out of the fitness room like I’d set you on fire.”
“I had homework,” she says, defensive.
I smile. “You say that like it was a felony.”
“Sometimes it is,” she mutters. “Against my dignity.”
I chuckle, and for a second the booth feels easy. Like two people who used to know each other slipping into an old rhythm. Molly takes a bite of her fries and chews slowly, thinking. Then she says, “So what? You fix things. You’re here for work. You’re taking care of your sister.”
“Yes.”
“And you just… decided to move into my building.”
“Ironwood Falls is small.”
“That’s not an answer.”
She waits.
I lean forward a little, lowering my voice. “It’s the only one you’re getting today.”
Molly’s breath catches — barely. Her eyes flick to my mouth again.
Then she blinks and sits back as if she can physically shove the moment away.
“One drink,” she reminds me, but her voice has lost some of its hardness. “One drink, one order of cheesy fries, one hour.”
I glance at my phone, checking the time. “We’ve got twenty minutes left.”
Molly exhales as if she’s irritated by the clock, and by me, and by the concept of how time passes. “Fine. But this isn’t a date.”
“Of course not,” I say. “I don’t know what that waitress was talking about. This is just two people who used to…” I let my voice trail off. “Two people who used to know each other catching up over a drink and some food.”
She narrows her eyes. “Stop agreeing with me so fast.”
I lift my hands in surrender. “Okay. Fine.”
“You’re doing it again.”
“Whatever you say.”
“Stop it.”
“I’m trying, but there’s a fucking problem: how the fuck can I agree with you without agreeing with you?”
Molly holds my stare, and for a moment—just a moment—she looks like the girl from the bleachers again. The one who kissed me like it was a dare and then walked away like she didn’t care.
Except now her eyes don’t say I don’t care.
They say this is dangerous because I might.
And that’s the problem.
Because the more she trusts me, the more I want to deserve it.