Chapter 8 #2
The heavy fire door swung shut behind us with a metallic thud. The stairwell smelled of damp concrete and fresh paint. An emergency light cast a greenish stain across the steps. Kate stopped one tread above me, her body angled toward the exit. There was no room to pretend this was casual.
I showed her the photo on my phone.
She didn't ask questions at first. Her face barely shifted, but her thumb went straight to the clasp of her watch and flicked it open. Then snapped it shut.
“Who has it?”
“A freelance photographer. Two local outlets reached out. Tessa wants to know what line we’re taking.”
“We don't take one.”
“That’s what I told her.”
Kate stepped down one stair. She handed the phone back without letting her fingers brush mine.
“Then it’s settled.”
“Not entirely.”
“What do you mean?”
A door opened on a lower floor. Footsteps echoed, followed by a cough and the bang of another door. I waited for the noise to fade.
“I don't want them calling you a ‘mystery woman’ like you're some seasonal drink special.”
A flush rose up Kate’s neck. She looked at the wall, not at me.
“I agree. It’s obnoxious.”
“I could say you matter to me and that I’m not discussing your private life.”
Her eyes snapped back to mine.
“No, Cole.”
“I wouldn't have to say anything else.”
“You’d already be saying too much.”
“It would just be the truth.”
Kate clutched the folder tighter to her chest, the cardboard edge bending slightly under her fingers.
“Which truth? That we went to a doctor’s appointment together because I had a one-night stand with you and now we’re trying to decide what to do about a pregnancy? Or the version where we look like a neat little couple so nobody asks awkward questions?”
“I don't want to pretend I don't know you.”
“I don't want to pretend either. I want them not to have the right to know.”
The words came fast and then hung between us. Outside, someone dropped a cleaning cart. The wheels rattled across the concrete.
“The photo already exists,” I said.
“Yes. And I can’t un-take it. But you don't have to help them build it into a story.”
I wanted to say it wasn't just about the photo. That since yesterday, it was hard to sit in my truck without thinking about a date in December. That I’d bought something stupid and yellow because I was terrified that not doing it was some kind of betrayal.
None of that defended anyone else's right to look inside her life.
“I’m not trying to help them,” I said.
Kate gave a dry, humorless laugh.
“You’re trying to make it hurt less for yourself.”
I stood motionless. So did she. The way she held the folder made it clear she knew she’d crossed a line, and she wasn't about to walk it back.
She was right. The thought of someone looking at that photo and assuming I was just a guy walking out of a coffee shop with a stranger had scraped against something ugly in me.
Not because I needed people to see me as a good guy.
Because I didn't want Kate looking like an interchangeable detail in a headline about me.
The problem was that both things could be true, and one didn't give me permission to choose for her.
“You’re right,” I said.
Kate blinked. The watch clasp remained open against her wrist.
“I didn't expect you to say that so fast.”
“Doesn't mean I like it.”
“That, I believe.”
A short laugh escaped me. Kate didn't laugh, but her shoulders eased down a fraction.
“I was thinking about the headline and how it felt to read it,” I said. “Not what it costs you if I answer. Not Halcyon. Not that yesterday was a doctor’s appointment, not an invitation for strangers to form an opinion about your body.”
Kate lowered the folder. For a second, her gaze dropped to my hands.
“Thank you for saying that.”
“I’m telling Tessa there’ll be no comment. I’ll make sure Halcyon isn’t mentioned either.”
“Won't she be angry?”
“Tessa’s been working with athletes for years. She has a whole repertoire of useful anger.”
“Lucky us.”
“She’d call it crisis management.”
“Don't say that like it’s a compliment.”
This time she smiled. It was faint, but I didn't need more than that to know the argument hadn't broken something we couldn't put back together.
“I hate that this exists,” Kate said, looking back down at the dark screen of my phone. “The photo, I mean. It makes me feel like I showed up late to a meeting about my own life.”
“Me too.”
“But I’m not going to let a sports site force me to decide what we are.”
“You shouldn't.”
Kate slipped one hand into her blazer pocket and clicked the watch shut with the other.
“Can we head to the meeting before Priya comes looking for us and delivers a lecture on preventive communication?”
“That’s a credible threat.”
“I know. I work with her.”
I pushed open the fire door and let her step through. Kate didn't brush my arm on the way out. But once we reached the hallway, she waited for me to catch up and walk beside her.
* * *
The pilot meeting ran fifty-seven minutes. I knew because Kate checked off the last three action items in her notebook before Joel even finished thanking everyone for not turning the meeting into a photo op.
Priya had arrived with a sample box of food bars for the community days, opening it like she was presenting laboratory evidence.
“This claims to be an apple oat bar,” she announced. “I see no apple. I see cardboard.”
“In my family, that would be considered a grave insult,” I said.
Kate looked up from her notes.
“Your family grows apples. They don't have jurisdiction over oat bars.”
“Moral jurisdiction.”
Priya looked at me, then at Kate. She found nothing to say, which was practically a miracle.
When we wrapped up, Tessa was waiting for me near reception. She’d tucked her tablet under her arm, her mouth pressed into a line I already knew.
“I’ve got an answer,” I told her before she could speak. “We don't comment on personal matters. Don't mention Halcyon, and don't confirm anyone’s identity.”
Tessa held my gaze for a second.
“Is that what she wants?”
“Yes.”
“Then that’s what we send.”
She didn't congratulate me. There was no need. She pulled out her phone and started typing as she walked toward her office.
My phone buzzed a few seconds later. The post was still there, shared by people I didn't know and commented on by strangers. I didn't open the notifications. I set the phone face down on the reception counter until Tessa reappeared around the corner.
“Done,” she said. “Now try not to give anyone a second photo today.”
“I’ll do my best.”
“That sentence right there is why I’m going gray early.”
I watched her walk away with her tablet.
Outside, the afternoon had cleared, the pitch looking violently green after the rain.
Kate stood by her car, on the phone with someone from Halcyon.
She didn't look for me. She didn't need to.
When she hung up, she raised a hand without looking fully in my direction.
I did the same.
Later that night, I parked the truck under the carport at the house. Yellow porch light washed across the windshield. I pulled the keys, checked my screen out of habit, and found a text from Kate.
Kate: Thanks for not speaking for me.
I read the words twice. Typed a reply, deleted it, and typed another.
Me: Thanks for telling me before I got it wrong.
The reply didn't come right away. I left the phone on the passenger seat and opened the glove compartment to grab the flashlight I used whenever a rat got under the dock.
The socks were tucked behind the first-aid kit, two scraps of yellow in the darkness of the compartment.
I shoved them deeper inside and shut the glove box.