34. Mack #2
“Don’t pretend you wouldn’t have given it to me.”
“With you there is no pretending,” I say before dropping my voice lower. “Besides, I’ve had my tongue in your ass. What’s left to pretend about, baby?”
Darcy’s eyes bounce between me and Tyler, who’s just grinning back at her now too. She’s completely composed except for the color riding up her throat that she absolutely cannot control, and I hold her gaze and let her have the composure because she’s earned it and it’s more fun this way anyway.
The food arrives before she can think of a comeback. Her sushi lands in front of her, my burger in front of me, Tyler’s steak on the other side of the table, and then the server sets down another basket of fries between Darcy and me.
She looks from the fries to Tyler.
“We didn’t order these.”
“I did.”
“When?”
“When you were deciding between the spicy tuna and the salmon.”
She furrows her brow.
“Why?”
Tyler cuts into his steak like this conversation was over before it started.
“Because you always steal ours.”
“I do not.”
She reaches into the new basket before she’s even finished denying it. Tyler catches my eye over the table for half a second and smirks.
Darcy finally tries the sushi.
The first bite makes her eyes close.
She leans back against the booth with the smallest little hum under her breath, like she’d forgotten we were sitting across from her for a second. The sound goes right through my chest.
“You think that’s good?” I shake my head. “Wait until—”
“Aoki,” Tyler finishes immediately.
I nod.
“She’ll love Aoki.”
Her eyes open immediately.
“What’s Aoki?”
“Little hole-in-the-wall over in Brighton.”
“You’d drive right past it if somebody didn’t tell you it was there,” Tyler says.
“But the sushi’s worth it.”
Darcy’s already reaching for another piece.
“We’re going.”
The answer’s out of my mouth before I think about it.
“Yeah.”
Tyler nods once, like that settles it.
“We’ve gotta come back here in the fall, too.”
I glance over.
“They deck this whole rooftop out every Sunday.”
He looks at Darcy.
“You’ll love it. Fire pits. Blankets. Hot cider.”
“We brought Mom last year.”
He laughs.
“She spent half the morning trying to sweet-talk the bartender into giving her the apple butter recipe.”
Tyler laughs.
“She almost got it.”
Darcy grins.
“I would’ve been helping.”
“I know. You’ll fit right in.”
I turn my beer once against the table.
The wind picks up across the rooftop, and Darcy rubs both hands up her bare arms once while she keeps talking. Before I can say anything Tyler’s already shrugging out of his jacket.
She notices halfway through her sentence.
“Tyler—”
“Put it on,” I say.
Her eyes flick to me before dropping to the jacket in Tyler’s hand. She studies both of us for a second like she’s deciding whether this is worth arguing about, then slips it on.
The sleeves swallow half her hands, the hem falling nearly to mid-thigh over that damned dress, and Ty and I both can’t help but watch as she tucks her fingers into the cuffs and curls deeper into the collar.
She looks down at herself.
“I feel like a little kid.”
Tyler laughs.
“You look comfortable.”
“I am.”
She says it absentmindedly, smoothing one hand over the sleeve.
“…Which is probably dangerous.”
She says it almost to herself.
“You wearing our clothes?”
“I think we’re past that, Trouble.”
“No,” her smile softens. “Comfortable.”
Tyler scoots closer to her.
“That wasn’t really about the jacket.”
Ty reaches for her hand and runs a thumb along her knuckles while we wait for her to finish.
“The last time I got comfortable, I looked up one day and realized I’d built my whole life around somebody else’s.”
Tyler doesn’t answer right away. Neither do I.
One sentence and the alarm bells start going off in my head as I’m playing the whole night backwards.
Is that what this looks like to her?
Like we’re already folding her into our lives before she’s had the chance to decide what she wants hers to look like?
“Nobody’s asking you to,” Tyler says too easily.
She nods and I let it drop.
But my head doesn’t.
Traffic builds up along Commonwealth while we walk home, the city finally starting to ease off now that the dinner crowd’s thinning out.
Somewhere near Marlborough, Darcy drifts back into the space between us without either of us asking, Tyler’s jacket hanging nearly to her knees now while one hand stays tucked inside the sleeve wrapped around mine.
Every few steps she gives our joined hands a lazy swing, laughing at something Tyler’s saying about the station, and I catch myself looking at her again.
The thought from dinner is still sitting in the back of my head.
Don’t build your life around somebody else’s.
I wonder if she’s still thinking about it too.
The brownstone comes into view before I get any farther than that, somebody I don’t recognize sitting on the front steps.
Tyler notices a second later because his voice cuts off mid-sentence.
Darcy feels both of us go quiet before she even looks up. Then her hand slips out of mine.
The guy stands as we get closer—dark jeans, pressed button-down, flowers in one hand like he stopped somewhere on purpose before coming here.
Darcy stops walking so fast Tyler nearly clips her shoulder.
“Oh, shit,” she whispers, almost to herself.
The guy looks straight at her.
“Hey, Dee.”
Something about the way he says it makes my fists clench. Darcy blinks once, staring at him like she’s trying to place two completely different versions of her life in the same moment.
“Brett.”
She doesn’t move toward him. The flowers bend slightly in his grip while he looks at us, and I realize he’s been standing out here long enough for the stems to start softening in his hand.
Tyler edges half a step closer to Darcy, who still hasn’t moved.
And this guy’s standing on our steps looking at her like he still thinks she belongs to him.