15. Timothy
Chapter fifteen
Timothy
The dryer-belt display takes up half the aisle, which feels excessive for an object none of us could identify ten minutes ago.
I hold Shane’s phone beside the packages, comparing Bethany’s picture to rows of identical black rubber loops while the fluorescent lights buzz overhead.
Bring back something that looks exactly like it.
I hear the instruction in her voice for the third time in ten minutes. I hate how much square footage it has claimed inside my skull. Rent free. Prime real estate.
Jonah holds up a package and squints at it. “This one looks right.”
“That's a tube. And it’s twenty inches long.”
He rotates it. “Maybe dryers need room for growth.”
“Put it back.”
The cart's front wheel squeaks with every step, a tiny rhythmic accusation. I am a functioning adult, I remind myself, and adjust my grip on the box of screws.
Bethany ordered all five of us to go, which should make my presence here completely unremarkable.
It does not explain why I want to order the guys around before we reached the aisle or why I have checked her picture four times when the model number is printed directly beneath it.
I know that's not casual. That's eager. That's a man with a problem.
Shane leads us through the appliance aisle with confidence. A casual observer might think we know what we are doing.
We do not.
After comparing the picture to three packages, we settle on the one with the matching model number.
“Should we get two?” I ask.
Everyone looks at me.
I shrug. “In case this happens again.”
Jonah’s grin appears slowly. “Or in case Bethany is impressed by preparedness.”
“Dryer belts wear out.”
“So does subtlety,” Maxon says.
Jonah catches me zooming in on the picture again and lifts an eyebrow.
“I like to be thorough.”
“Thorough for management,” he says, grinning.
Something hot and fast flares in my chest, quicker than the joke deserves.
“She knows what she’s doing,” I say.
I lower the phone.
Maxon trails half a step behind us, quieter than usual after the conversation in Shane’s truck.
For a second, I am grateful the group has already found another victim today.
Then Maxon catches me studying the photo again.
His eyebrow lifts.
I give him a look that says he has no standing to judge anyone.
After what he admitted in the truck, he apparently agrees. He turns toward a display of dryer vents.
"Yeah, totally," Maxon says.
Nobody points out how deranged that is, mostly because nobody wants me returning the favor.
Wesley picks up a cheaper belt and turns it over. "This one's basically the same, right?"
I look at the picture on my phone, then at the package in Wesley’s hand.
Somewhere in the back of my mind, Bethany calmly explains how our improvisation caused an electrical fire.
“Put it back.”
The aisle goes quiet.
Jonah's face does something slow and delighted, like a man watching a car crash.
"Wow," he says, stretching it out.
"I'm defending her work," I say. "Not defending her."
"Right," Maxon says. "Totally different thing."
The guys close in slightly, cart angled across one end of the aisle. A woman in a cardigan glances over from the paint section, clearly deciding whether she's about to witness a scene.
"I'm just saying facts," I say, which is the exact sentence a man says right before everyone agrees he's lost the argument.
At checkout, the cashier scans the belt, glances at the receipt, and asks, "You guys fixing a dryer?"
"He's trying to impress a woman with excellent lint management," Jonah says, deadpan, not even looking at her.
I consider, briefly and seriously, whether I could vanish into the battery aisle and quietly begin a new life.
The cashier laughs, and hands me the receipt. "I hope she is very impressed."
Even mid-humiliation, some traitor part of my brain is already picturing Bethany's face when the belt turns out to be the right one.
When we get back to the lodge, I can't wait to get out of the truck.
Then I see Bethany at the kitchen table, and the guys' voices blur straight into static.
She's bent over paperwork, pen moving fast, hair coming loose from whatever knot it started the morning in.
"We got it," I say.
She looks up, and for a second the room narrows down to just her.
"Good."
Under Bethany's supervision, Shane and I wrestle the belt into place.
"Belt first, then the pulley," Bethany says.
Jonah nudges Shane and mouths something I don't catch, both of them grinning.
"Hand me the flathead," she says, and I have it in her palm before she finishes the word.
Before long, the dryer is back to looking like a dryer.
She pats the top of it, like a good puppy. "Let's see if it works."
The dryer clicks on.
Bethany smiles, relieved and happy with our work.
"Thank you," she says to the room, and everyone nods, already drifting back to their lives.
Then she looks at me. Just me. "Thank you," she says again, quieter.
I mumble something about checking on something and start retreating toward the back door before my face does anything I'll regret. Staying in the same room as her suddenly feels riskier than blocking a slap shot barehanded.
Cold air slides in before I've got the door fully open, biting at my wrists.
Bethany follows me out, revised checklist in hand, pen still tucked behind her ear.
Our breath fogs in the cold, twin clouds drifting off toward the dark shape of the rink. She keeps looking at me a beat too long, arms crossed against the chill, tracking something I can't name.
"You're reliable, Timothy," she says.
Reliable is a good word. A warm word.
A word people use for someone they trust completely and never think about kissing.