Chapter 20
Chapter Twenty
Residence of Jason and Victoria King
Tacoma, Washington
Allie balanced the pizza on one arm and knocked on the door with her free hand. A stack of flattened boxes rested against the wall in the hallway outside Jason and Victoria's apartment, and she could hear muffled movement behind the door before Victoria pulled it open.
“You’re a lifesaver,” Victoria chirped, stepping aside to let Allie in.
Joey was cradled in her arm, and she looked up at her mother, wide-eyed and squirming, with one tiny fist clutching the collar of Victoria's shirt.
Dark circles underscored Victoria's eyes, but her smile was warm and genuine.
“I was five minutes away from ordering something I probably would have regretted.”
“And that is what I'm here for. I figured even if you had dinner, pizza can always be reheated.” Allie stepped inside and stopped as she got a glimpse of the place.
The apartment she knew so well had been transformed into a landscape of boxes stacked in uneven columns, some sealed and labeled in Jason's blocky handwriting, while others were gaping open and waiting.
The bookshelves were empty and all the art and photos removed from the walls.
“This is why I love you,” Victoria said, gently placing Joey in the playpen set up next to the couch. She grabbed the warm box from Allie. “That smells divine.”
“Tell me about it. I almost dug in on the way over. Not sure which I want first, the pepperoni and sausage or the veggie.” Allie put her hands on her hips and eyed the controlled chaos.
“I know,” Victoria said, reading her expression. “It looks like a warehouse exploded in here.”
“I was going to say it has a certain rustic charm.”
Victoria laughed and headed toward the kitchen while Allie bent over the playpen and picked up Joey. “Hello, cutie pie. Have you been helping Mommy pack?”
Joey gurgled and put her tiny fingers on Allie’s chin, then tried to grab her hair. “Oh no, you don’t. C’mon, let’s go see what your mom is doing.” She followed her friend into the other room where was laying out a stack of paper plates.
“This way you don’t have to choose,” Victoria explained, putting a slice of each onto a plate and handing it to Allie. “Jason ran out to get more supplies. Apparently, we underestimated how much stuff two adults and one very small person can accumulate.”
Allie sat down at the table and set Joey on her knee.
The baby immediately grabbed for her pizza, and Allie had to lean back to keep it out of reach.
“Nice try, kid. Give it a few months.” She turned back to Victoria.
“I hear you. When I moved back in with Grams, I couldn’t believe the sheer quantity of knickknacks, tchotchkes, and books I’d acquired. ”
“Now books I can understand.” Victoria took a bite.
“Oh my, that hits the spot. I haven't even thought about food today,” she admitted, lowering herself into a chair.
She took Joey from Allie and put her in the bouncer on the floor beside her.
“Between this one deciding that naps are optional and trying to figure out which boxes go where, I had no idea what to do for dinner.”
“Maybe I should have brought four,” Allie smiled. “You need fuel if you're going to survive this move.”
They ate silently for a few moments while both watching Joey. The baby kicked her legs against the fabric seat while Allie ate up her sweet giggles.
“So,” Allie said, nudging Victoria's knee under the table. “When do I get to see this house? I'm starting to feel left out.”
Her friend held up a finger as she continued to chew. “Not yet. I want you to see it when everything's in place. The furniture, the curtains, all of it. I want the full reveal.”
Allie shot her a mock glare. “You're killing me.”
“I know, and I'm enjoying it.” Victoria grinned. “But it's worth the wait, I promise. You should see the kitchen. It has actual counter space. Like, more than two feet of it.”
“Revolutionary. Who even knew that was a thing?”
“And Jason is getting a home office. A real one, with a door that closes and everything. No more working at the dining table with paperwork spread across the placemats.”
Allie smiled. She could picture it, Jason hunched over at the kitchen table, Victoria stepping around him to get to the stove. In this apartment, the boundaries between work and home had always been thin. A house would finally give them room to breathe.
“What about you?” Allie asked. “What are you most looking forward to?”
Victoria's expression softened, and she looked down at Joey, who was blinking slower now, her legs beginning to still. “The space. She’ll have room to crawl around when she's ready. And the yard, especially. And I've been thinking about giving piano lessons again.”
“Really?” Before the cancer, piano lessons had been a major rhythm in Victoria’s life.
“Nothing major. Probably just a few students. There's a room in the new house that would be perfect for it. It’s got good light and enough space for my piano.” Victoria's eyes lit up as she talked about something so close to her heart. “I miss it. I used to love watching a child’s face when something finally clicked, you know? When they'd been struggling with a piece for weeks and then one day their hands just knew what to do. It’s such a good feeling.”
“I think it's wonderful,” Allie smiled.
Joey's eyes had grown heavy. Her blinks were now long and languid. Allie reached down and gently rocked the bouncer with her foot, a slow, steady rhythm that matched the baby's breathing. Joey's gaze drifted to Allie's face, and then her lids finally closed.
Allie kept rocking, watching the baby's chest rise and fall in the even cadence of sleep.
Something stirred in her she couldn't quite name.
It wasn't envy. Victoria and Jason had earned every good thing coming their way, and Allie felt nothing but happiness for them.
But there was a subtle longing underneath it, perhaps her own desire for a life like the one they were building.
Victoria and Jason had weathered things that would have broken most couples, and they had come out the other side stronger for it. They built something solid, something real, and now they were expanding it, making room for another life.
Allie wondered if she would ever have that. If her work would always come first and the wounds she carried would always keep her at arm's length.
“So,” Victoria said in a sing-song voice, and Allie braced herself. “When's the last time you saw Ethan?”
Allie kept her eyes on Joey. “A couple of weeks ago.”
“And?”
“And what?”
Victoria tilted her head, waiting. She had a gift for silence that rivaled any interrogator Allie had ever worked with.
“We're having dinner at his place next weekend,” Allie said, aiming for casual and landing somewhere closer to transparent.
“Dinner,” Victoria repeated, a smile pulling at the corners of her mouth. “Just the two of you?”
“Shep will probably be there.”
“Mm-hmm.” Victoria took another bite of pizza and chewed with exaggerated patience. “And how are things going between you two?”
Allie felt the heat rise up her neck before she could stop it. She busied herself with her own slice, but Victoria had already spotted it.
“Allie Bishop, are you blushing?”
“I am not.”
“You absolutely are. Your ears are turning pink.” Victoria leaned forward, delighted. “What happened? What aren't you telling me?”
Allie set her pizza down and pressed her palms flat against the table. She could deflect, even change the subject and steer them back to anything else. But Victoria was looking at her with that open, expectant warmth that made lying feel pointless.
“He kissed me,” Allie said simply.
Victoria's mouth fell open. “I'm sorry, he kissed you and you're just now telling me? How long have you been sitting on this?”
“It just happened.”
“Define ‘just.’ Because you said you saw him a couple of weeks ago.”
Allie couldn't help the small smile that escaped. “Okay, fine. I've been holding out on you.”
“Holding out on me.” Victoria shook her head in exaggerated disbelief. “I tell you everything. Every terrible thing Joey does at three in the morning, every argument Jason and I have about paint colors, and you don't tell me that the man you've been circling around for months finally kissed you?”
“We haven't been circling.”
“You have absolutely been circling. Jason and I have had entire conversations about it.”
“That's horrifying.”
“It's loving.” Victoria reached across the table and squeezed Allie's hand. Her expression had shifted from playful outrage to something gentler, something that made Allie's throat constrict. “I'm happy for you, Allie. You deserve this.”
Allie looked down at their joined hands, then at Joey sleeping peacefully in the bouncer, then at the boxes stacked against the walls of this apartment that had been her refuge for the last year.
Everything was changing. Victoria and Jason were moving on to something bigger, something better, and maybe she was too, in her own cautious way.
“It was a good kiss,” she admitted, and Victoria's laugh rang through the apartment, bright enough that Joey stirred in her bouncer before settling again.
They finished eating and turned their attention to packing.
Allie wrapped dishes in newspaper while Victoria sorted through a drawer of kitchen utensils, debating which ones had earned their place in the new house and which ones would go into the donation box.
They fell into an easy rhythm, the conversation drifting from packing strategies to Victoria's plans for the new kitchen to a spirited disagreement about whether anyone actually needed a garlic press.
The front door opened, and Jason appeared with his arms loaded. He had a tower of flattened boxes under one arm and two bags of packing supplies in the other, a roll of tape perched on top of the stack like a precarious crown.
“Reinforcements have arrived,” he announced, kicking the door shut behind him. He surveyed the kitchen, taking in the pizza boxes and the women surrounded by half-packed boxes. “I see you've been productive.”
“We saved you a couple of slices,” Victoria said.
“Two?” He set everything down. “I was gone for an hour.”
“You should have been faster,” Allie said. “Just kidding. There’s plenty.”
Jason gave her a look that said he wasn't entirely sure about that. He shook his head and grabbed a slice, eating standing up while he surveyed their progress. “You got the good plates wrapped already. Nice.”
“Allie did the plates. I supervised.”
“Delegated,” Allie corrected. “She delegated.”
They worked together for the next hour, the three of them falling into the comfortable dynamic that defined their friendship.
Jason hauled the heavier boxes from the bedroom closet while Victoria labeled everything and Allie filled gaps with packing paper and bubble wrap.
The apartment gradually took on the skeletal look of a place being left behind, its personality stripped away box by box.
By nine-thirty, Joey was in bed and Allie was taping shut a box of books when Jason appeared at her elbow.
“All right,” he said, plucking the tape from her hands. “Time to go.”
“I can stay longer. There's still the hall closet.”
“The hall closet will be here tomorrow.” He walked her toward the door with the gentle insistence of someone who wouldn't take no for an answer. “We need to be sharp in the morning. We've got a lot to work through on this case, and I can't have either one of us falling asleep at our desks.”
“I don't fall asleep at my desk.”
“But I might. Go home, Bishop.” He opened the door and handed her the jacket she'd draped over a box. “Get some rest.”
Victoria called from the kitchen. “Text me when you get home.”
“Yes, Mom,” Allie replied, and heard Victoria's indignant response cut short by the closing door.
She stood in the hallway for a moment with her jacket over her arm, listening to the muffled sounds of Jason and Victoria talking on the other side of the wall.
She could picture them, standing amid the boxes.
Tomorrow they would pack more boxes and argue about what to keep and what to leave behind, and eventually they would carry their life across town to a house with a yard and a room for piano lessons.
Allie thought about Ethan, about the gentle weight of his hand on her face when he kissed her.
About dinner next weekend and the nervous flutter it sent through her stomach every time she thought about it.
She considered the possibility that maybe she was building something too, even if she couldn't discern its shape yet.
She got in her car and started the engine, already thinking about what to wear for her date next weekend. Because she could now, finally, admit to herself that that’s what it was.
A date.