Chapter 10
I can see it in his eyes: the moment when he believes me. —Milo Warner
Did I overstep? I’m worried I overstepped.
Except I’m pretty sure I haven’t, because Noah manages to follow me through the café, inches away from my back, as I smile and wave and make the occasional gesture in his direction.
“Noah’s working at the community center with Gabe and me,” I call out in response to a few raised eyebrows.
People nod, and there are a few hellos in our direction from one side of the café. But then everyone goes right back to their breakfast, because people in Devon Falls do not like to be interrupted while Luis is serving pancakes.
Noah lets out a long sigh once we arrive at my favorite booth, all the way on the back wall.
It’s tucked into a corner, offering us perfect privacy.
Or as much privacy as a person can ever get in Devon Falls, anyway.
“Okay,” Noah says. “I did it,” he adds softly.
He sends me a wide-eyed, sincere smile. “Thank you, Milo.”
“Not a problem at all,” I tell him easily. I order the pancake special, and the two of us dive in. Noah makes one or two inappropriate noises while he eats, as he should, because damn, Luis makes a good pancake.
I maybe have to adjust my jeans once or twice after those noises begin.
Fuck. It probably shouldn’t have turned me on, helping Noah like that.
He’s right. There’s some wiring that’s aligned here, in this space between the two of us.
Some wiring that actually fits together in ways I’ve never imagined possible.
But that thought’s too dangerous, especially when Noah starts making orgasmic pancake noises. So as soon as we’re done with second breakfast, I get him out of the café and start the tour of the rest of the town.
“That’s Thai for Two,” I tell him as we head down Main Street to walk off the pancakes. “They have comedy nights and open mic nights. Sometimes karaoke. Oh, here’s the bakery.”
“Bakery?” Noah comes to an abrupt stop on the sidewalk next to me. “I can’t eat anything else!”
I laugh. “I hear you. But Marion’s place is only open for a few hours every day. We’ll get some things to go, and then we’ll have them when we get our appetites back in a few hours.”
Noah looks wary, but he follows me in the door. The bright, tiny space is taken up mostly by a long display case filled with pastries and a few small, currently empty tables, and the air is heavy with the scent of cinnamon and butter.
“Milo!” An older woman, wearing a pair of pink Vans and a sweater patterned in robins and bluebirds, smiles brightly when she sees us. “Oh, and you brought a friend. This is the new employee at the community center, yes? I’m Marion Stevenson.”
Shit. Should I have asked Noah if he felt comfortable coming in here? But the bakery’s empty this late in the morning, and Noah just smiles and waves. “It’s great to meet you. Milo says your pastries are amazing.” He sniffs at the air.
“They’re delectable, if I do say so myself. Instagram and that Tokker place I keep hearing about both agree. The usual?” she asks me as she begins grabbing up baked goods from under the counter and placing them carefully into a box.
“Yes, ma’am,” I agree. After eating bacon, eggs, and an epic portion of pancakes piled with whipped butter pads the size of my thumb, I should probably downsize my usual order slightly.
But breathing in the air of the bakery makes that plan impossible.
Whatever Marion’s serving here, I want it. Always.
“Wonderful. And I threw in a little surprise for the newbie. Welcome to Devon Falls, Noah.” Marion winks. “Milo, you tell Sam that I better see him at our next knitting club meeting. I’ll help him with that new sweater pattern he can’t figure out.”
“Will do,” I tell her as I pick up the box.
“Um, catch me up?” Noah asks as he follows me back to the sidewalk. “Devon Falls has a knitting club, and Sam is in it?”
“He makes decent hats and scarves,” I say as I pass him a scone dripping in maple glaze. “I know you’re not hungry, but just take a bite while it’s still fresh. This thing will change your life.”
He raises an eyebrow. “We have maple baked goods in upstate New York, you know. Believe it or not, Devon Falls is only one of many, many places where maple products are produced.”
That’s what he thinks. “Try a bite. Tell me I’m wrong.” I stop walking for a moment and wait while he sinks his teeth into the scone.
“Well, shoot,” he whispers. Then he demolishes the entire thing in three bites. “I wasn’t even hungry!” he practically wails as I lead him across the street and over to the large green area that makes up the town square. I sit down at a picnic table, and he falls onto the bench across from me.
“See? I told you. Marion knows what she’s doing.
And her mittens don’t suck, by the way. Now, here’s the next stop on our tour.
Welcome to the Devon Falls Square, home of the infamous statue dedicated to the town festival.
Which, through no fault of its own, somehow ended up looking just like a damn poop emoji. ”
Noah takes his eyes off the box of baked goods long enough to turn and study the statue behind our table.
It’s about eight feet tall and four feet wide, and every time I look at it, I can see what the artist was going for: a shape of whirling leaves, wider at the bottom and thinner on top, with other shapes—kids, I think? —chasing the leaves excitedly.
The intent’s there. Unfortunately, the intent doesn’t match the impact. The thing definitely looks like a poop emoji.
“I read about it, and I saw some of the viral pictures.” Noah frowns. “But yeah. They don’t really do it justice. I’m surprised no one’s made t-shirts for that thing.”
“Benson’s friend Jeremy has been trying to convince the town to make merch ever since he first saw it.
” I tilt my face up to the sunny sky above us.
“This is the first place Jack took me when he first brought me here, back when we were just baby doctors. After I stopped laughing, I sat in this square for hours, sinking into the peace, you know? Even when it’s loud in Devon Falls, it’s never loud here like New York City.
I knew right away this town was a place I would keep coming back to. ”
I notice Noah tilting his head slightly as well, like he’s leaning into the air in the same way I always do here.
“I think I know what you’re talking about.
” He peeks into the box and takes out another scone.
He tears off a piece and passes it across the table to me.
“Do you think,” he says quietly, “that if the people here knew my past, they might treat me differently than the people in Pottsville did?”
I take the piece of pastry he hands me, but I don’t raise it to my mouth.
“Do you want to tell me?” I ask him softly.
“How they treated you there? You don’t have to,” I add quickly when the color immediately drains from Noah’s face.
“You never, ever have to tell me. I’m just offering to listen, if you want. ”
He’s quiet for a long time before he finally speaks, and I sink into the silence between us. I hope I’m giving him the space to make this moment with me whatever he needs it to be.
“It was kind of my own fault,” he finally says. “The way people treated me, I mean. I was the one who decided to stay close to home for college, instead of going away. I could have had a fresh start.” He shrugs. “But I wanted to stay close to Uncle Stan. So I did.”
“Until now.”
“Until now.” He sighs as he plays with the scone in his hand.
“You can tell me, Chucks,” I remind him. “Or not.” I send him a smile that I hope reassures him I’ll never judge anything he tells me. “It’s up to you. It’s all up to you. Always will be, with me.”
I can see it in his eyes: the moment when he believes me. The moment when he decides I’m just as safe as I claim to be.
And then he starts talking.
“Pottsville’s always been a place where a lot of people struggled financially.
Lots of farms that haven’t been able to stay afloat, and the manufacturing industry kind of collapsed a few decades ago.
” He sends me a half-smile. “My mom grew up there. She was supposed to be a dancer, like you,” he adds quietly.
“No shit.” I never knew that.
“Yeah, but she didn’t make it. She hurt her knee dancing in an off-Broadway tour, and then she ended up coming back to Pottsville to help my grandpa when he was diagnosed with cancer.
That’s when she had me, but I never even knew who my father was.
” He finally sets the scone down on top of the box in front of us, and I do the same with my piece.
“My grandpa died, and there was my mom, stuck in the town she'd always wanted to escape, with a kid she didn’t really want, a failed career, and basically zero opportunities.”
“Shit, Chucks.” I shake my head. “How old was she?”
“About the age I am now.” Noah squints at me slightly. “I think about that sometimes, about how alone in the world she was when she was no older than I am now.” He sighs. “But then Uncle Stan hired her at the feed store, and he took us under his wing. He was basically the dad I didn’t have.”
Ah. I’ve never heard that part in the news stories about Stan and Noah. Headlines like to focus on how his mom died and on Stan’s decision to adopt him, but I never knew they had history before all that. “So Stan’s always been a mensch.”
Noah laughs. “Are you Jewish?”
“Nah, but my sister’s partner is, and I’ve kind of always loved that word when she uses it.” I shrug. “I like the idea that some people just move through the world doing good.”
“Yeah, that’s Uncle Stan.” Noah wraps his arms around his chest. “He really did his best to help my mom. But the longer we stayed in Pottsville, the more depressed she got. That’s when she got into meth.”
I wince. Tale as old as time. Life fucks the person up, person turns to escape, escape fucks the person up.