7. Rocco
ROCCO
I volunteer to drive because it gives me something to do. Keys, wheel, signal, turn—tasks that line up and behave. Meg slides into the passenger seat with her tote, her apron folded on top. She looks like she slept two hours and argued with a mirror.
Brave face. I know the brave face. She’s used it since homeroom.
“Thanks,” she says. Small word, steady voice.
“Of course,” I say. I turn the heater down so the vents don’t dry her out. She has sensitive skin. I check the mirrors even though they’re already right. I back out slow because she gets motion sickness easily.
Things I’ve done for years. Things that mean more now somehow.
We don’t talk much in the first four blocks. It’s the kind of silence that isn’t empty. She tucks her hands into the sleeves of the sweatshirt she borrowed. My hoodie from the hook by the door. I look away before I think too much about that.
The city is pale-blue cold. The sidewalks shine where last night’s wet clung and froze.
Neon OPEN signs blink awake like the block is just waking up.
The wipers grumble once and find a rhythm.
I stop at a yellow I could have made and don’t explain why.
She looks at the light like it’s doing her a favor.
“Hud texted,” she says finally, gaze on the road ahead. “He’s delivering to Ms. Delaney first so she can scold him and get it out of her system.”
I snort. “Front-loading the scold. Smart.”
She smiles without showing teeth. It’s almost nothing and still a relief. I want the real one. The one that lifts to her eyes at the corners.
Not now. Not my job. I keep the car between the lines. That’s my job.
The closer we get to Bea’s, the more her shoulders square. The brave face sets—chin up, eyes bright, mouth calm. It’s convincing if you don’t know her. Her hands flatten imaginary wrinkles when she’s bracing. She uses both of them now.
She’s not fooling me. She’s not trying to. Not trying hard enough, anyway.
“Want me to run in with you?” I’ll do exactly what she needs, even if it changes in the four seconds it takes to answer.
She stares through the big front window. “I’m good. Aqua’s on. In full regalia.”
“She’ll scare away any lingering questions.” Why did I say that? I shouldn’t have said that.
“Exactly.” A breath. “Bex too.” She didn’t notice I said something too meaningful. Good.
“Then you’re set.” I pull into the space across from the shop, the one that’s technically fifteen-minute but no one polices.
I get out before she can say she doesn’t need help, and I grab the box of milk crates from the back because they always need milk moved. She lets me take it.
Aqua is at the register already, blonde wig high and makeup on point.
She pivots when she hears the door and gives Meg the kind of once-over you only earn if you’ve shared closing shifts.
“There she is,” she says, voice like a bell in a big room.
“You look like a woman who’s going to make coffee and commit arson in her heart. ”
“And in a pricy apartment building if the day goes badly,” Meg says. She’s almost smiling again. “Hi, beautiful.”
“Don’t flirt unless you mean it, I’m fragile,” Aqua says, then spots the milk. “Bless you, Rocco. Back fridge. Bex is setting honey out.”
Bex pops up from behind the pastry case like a prairie dog and wiggles a tongs hello. “Morning! You two look like you slept three minutes.”
“Generous,” Meg says. She ties her apron on, smooths it.
I carry the crates through to the back, stack them where they belong, and check the seal on one because I always do. When I come back out, Aqua is already halfway through talking Meg into the first hour, and Bex is arranging pastries like a tiny city.
“Want me to fix the hinge while I’m here?” I ask, nodding toward the back door.
Meg’s eyes flick, calculating time. “If it’s quick.”
“It’s quick,” I say. I find the screwdriver where it always is, tighten what needs tightening, oil what needs oiling, and wipe up what drips. The door opens and closes without complaining. Small victory.
I like small victories. They add up.
“Thank you,” she says, and on the second syllable her brave face slips a millimeter.
I see it. I don’t know what to do with last night in a room full of daylight and pastry labels.
I do know what not to do. I don’t touch her shoulder, because that would be for me.
I don’t say anything weighted, because that would be for me too.
“Text if you need anything,” I tell her. “I’ll have my phone on me at the shelter.”
Aqua points a lacquered nail at me. “If anyone who looks like a man tries to talk to her about cars or stocks, I’m calling you.”
“Please do. I’ll bring a net.”
Meg huffs something that’s almost a laugh. “Go. Help dogs before I change my mind and put you on dishes.”
“You can’t afford me,” I deadpan, and she rolls her eyes the way I was hoping she would.
Outside, the air is bright and mean. I shove my hands into my hoodie pockets and walk fast to fight the impulse to turn back and make sure she remembers to drink water. Aqua will put the glass in her hand and glare until it’s empty. She’s covered.
The shelter sits four turns and a short stretch down from the shop, squat brick with a chain-link run out back and a hand-painted sign the neighborhood kids made.
The place smells like bleach and wet and the kind of hope that keeps showing up even when it gets its heart broken.
I breathe in and out and let the routine put its arms around me.
I clock in on the clipboard by the door, like always. Today is about fur and food and water bowls that aren’t clean enough yet. Best way to clear my head. I say a quiet hey to the first dog that looks at me. He looks away like it’s too early.
Fair enough. It is.
The manager nods at me from the office window and points to the whiteboard. The morning list is already up. Kennel clean. Laundry. Dishes. Walks rotation. Intake at nine. Familiar, ordered, doable. Perfect.
I almost pull my phone before I start, thumb hovering over Meg’s name. The text I almost send is not long: Last night meant more than I can say. Or shorter: I’m not okay. In the good way. Or stupider: I keep thinking about your laugh right before we got started.
I don’t send any of them. I tuck the phone back in my pocket. I pick up a scoop. I start where I always start.
Clean water first. I move down the line, empty, rinse, refill, set down, slide to the next. Dogs watch me with the same look people do when they’re waiting for a thing and trying to be cool about it.
I talk to them without thinking. Hey, buddy. Morning. I see you. Hold on, I got you. It sounds silly out loud. It’s not silly to them. Some of them have barely heard a kind word.
By the time I hit the fifth kennel, my breath is lined up with the work. Pour, wipe, swap towel, tuck, latch. The muscle memory takes over. The part of my brain that keeps replaying last night finally goes a little quiet. Not erased. Just far enough away that I can see straight. I hang on to that.
The anxious hound from last week stands up when I pass and sits immediately when he notices he did a big action. I crouch. “Hey, Brownie,” I say, low. It’s not his name—we don’t know it. He was abandoned here. But he’s brown, so it works for now.
He inches forward, decides that’s too brave, inches back. I put the water down and slide my hand under the opening like a question mark. After a minute, his nose bumps my knuckles and he exhales. I hum one note.
It’s instinct these days. Nothing more. I don’t have more to give than the occasional hum. Lost my real voice years ago, thanks to a virus that lodged in my throat and stole my tenor opera career.
He licks my thumb once and retreats like he didn’t mean to. Fine. We’ll count it. Brownie is coming around. I hum a little more, and it seems to put him at ease.
My brain tries to fill the empty with her name. I don’t let it. I keep my eyes on the sink. I keep my hands in the water. The animals in this building ask for nothing except what they need. Easy to be the person who can give that when the ask is simple and immediate.
Food. Clean. Walk. Warm. Hum a tune now and then.
Intake arrives early. A pair of dogs with the same head and different bodies.
Somebody writes their weights on a clipboard.
Somebody else checks ears, eyes, teeth. I hold the leash for a minute and rub the spot behind the bigger one’s shoulder blades because I know little tricks about where bodies store worry.
The manager nods me toward the laundry and I go there next because there’s a rhythm to it that could hypnotize you if you’re tired enough.
Wouldn’t mind being hypnotized right about now.
I almost call her again, between loads, when the room is just machines and me and the sound my brain makes when it’s left alone.
I take the phone out. I put it back. What would I say?
We can’t do that again , maybe, in the same breath as I would say yes if you asked .
Both true. None of my business to make the first one into a rule without her.
Not my job to ask for the second. I swallow and keep folding.
For a while, it works. It really does. Space opens between now and last night. The dogs need me more than my head does, and that’s a relief. I put water where water goes and blankets where blankets go, and I say good dog to faces that look like they want to believe me.
When I pull out my phone at noon to check the time, there’s a text from Meg.
It’s not a paragraph. It’s a bee. Yellow and dumb and perfect.
I feel something in my chest unclench and then clench again.
I type buzz and delete it. Smile emoji? A rose?
A heart? No. I send nothing. There’s nothing I can say right now that can’t be misconstrued.
I put the phone away and finish the round like a person who knows dogs remember if you stop in the middle.
By early afternoon, the to-do list is shorter. The whiteboard looks friendlier. The laundry is mostly folded. The bowls sparkle in a way only stainless steel can. Brownie is asleep with his nose tucked under his paw. I hum again as I pass, and he doesn’t wake up. That feels like a win I can keep.
I clock out by signing the clipboard again. The manager gives me a look that could be a question and I give a thumbs-up that means “I’ll be back.” I step outside, and the air is different, softer. My phone buzzes once.
Hudson: Home?
Me: On my way.
Walking back into our hallway feels strange and also normal.
Inside, it smells like whatever Hudson cooked this morning and the lemon cleaner he uses when he’s pretending to calm down.
He’s on the couch with his feet on the table and a look on his face like he’s talked himself down from a ladder.
The TV is on mute. The closed captions mention a local council vote.
“Hey,” he says.
“Hey,” I say back. I kick off my shoes because noise feels like the wrong choice.
I hang my hoodie on the hook. Meg will have to take the hoodie she stole into her room, since there are no more available hooks.
I kind of like that idea. I keep my hands busy with small straightening that doesn’t need doing.
He watches me do the ritual. When I sit, he gives it a breath. “You good with her staying?” We had this conversation before, which means it’s eating at him.
I look at the TV because it’s easier than looking at him. “Yeah. Of course.”
“Okay,” he says. He nods like that was expected. He taps his thumb against his kneecap twice. The room records both little lies and keeps them to itself. “Me too.”
We sit in it. Let it be what it is. Two men who know exactly what last night meant, pretending we’re built to hold the after without leaking emotions. We are and we aren’t. It doesn’t matter. She needs a place to sleep. We can both do that part.
“Deliveries?” I ask, because asking about his route lets him talk about something he knows how to finish.
“On time,” he says. “Ms. Delaney snapped at me anyway. Twins tried to make me tell them a fight story, and I told them about pancakes instead.”
“Brave choice.”
“Educational.” He glances at the hall. “She texted a bee.”
“I got one too,” I say, before I can stop myself. Then I add, “Probably thinking of Aunt Bea’s wall. Habit.”
“Yeah,” he says. He thumbs-up his own thought. “Probably.”
We let the captions run. A commercial about mattresses thinks it knows what tired looks like.
The afternoon pushes its way across the floorboards toward the couch.
In a minute, I’ll stand up and shower and set something out for dinner we may or may not be hungry for.
In a minute, he’ll get up and go look in on the guest room like a guard who walks the perimeter.
For now, we sit where we can hear the soft of the apartment and pretend we’re not listening for the sound of Meg’s key in the lock. We both know we are. Neither of us says it.