15. Buzz #3
Her expression softened slightly. “Thanks, Dad.”
Ezra squeezed her shoulder on his way out. “This role is a lot in the first few weeks. Give yourself room.”
Lucy nodded. “I am.”
She was lying. He believed her because he wanted to. Or because fathers, even good ones, sometimes saw what they needed to see in order to keep breathing.
Ezra left.
Sarah followed, pausing only long enough to look between me and Lucy one more time. “Two-thirty,” she said.
Lucy nodded. “Yes.”
Sarah’s gaze landed on me. “Do not be late.”
“I am wounded by the implication.”
“You should not be.”
Then she left too.
Alois was last. He stopped beside me on his way out. I already hated whatever was about to happen.
He looked down at me. “You are not subtle.”
“I’m not doing anything.”
Alois stared.
I held his stare for about three seconds before my survival instincts woke up. “Okay,” I said. “I am doing some things.”
“Fewer things,” he said.
“That advice feels vague.”
“It is the amount you will understand.”
Then he walked out.
Which left me alone with Lucy.
For the first time all morning, the room got quiet in a way I could not joke my way through.
Lucy stood at the front of the room, gathering folders into one neat stack. Her movements were efficient.
I stood slowly.
“You don’t have to stay,” she said, not looking at me. “I’ll send the updated walkthrough invite.”
“I know.”
She slid one folder beneath another. “Then why are you still here?”
Fair question with terrible answer options. Because I knew when she was pretending. Because I remembered too much. Because every version of me that had ever loved her was standing in that room, making it impossible to leave.
I kept my voice easy. “Wanted to make sure we were good for later.”
“We are.”
“Okay.”
She picked up the packet I had slid her earlier and held it out. “Your copy.”
I took it. Our fingers did not touch. Somehow that felt intentional.
“You handled all of that,” I said, “like it wasn’t held together with duct tape and three threatening emails.”
Her eyes lifted to mine. “I handled it because it needed to be handled.”
“I know.”
“I don’t need anyone making it look like I can’t do my job.”
“That’s not what I was doing.”
“No?”
“No.”
She crossed her arms. Professional Lucy would have kept organizing folders. This Lucy crossed her arms. Progress, maybe. Or danger. Usually, with her, those two things looked the same.
“I wasn’t trying to save you,” I said.
Her expression tightened.
I shook my head once, frustrated with myself because even that sounded wrong. “I mean, I know you don’t need that. Obviously. You could run half this building with a dead phone and no coffee.”
“That is oddly specific.”
“I’ve seen you do more with less.”
Her mouth twitched before she stopped it.
I took one careful breath and did not chase it too hard. “I just know when a room starts pressing in,” I said. “That’s all.”
Lucy went still. Like those words had slipped into a place I had not meant to reach.
For a second, the conference room disappeared. It was just her and me and all the years between us, crowded with things we had never said right.
Her voice was quieter when she answered. “You don’t know everything anymore, Ty.”
Ty. Not Mr. Burns. Not Buzz.
It hit so hard I had to look away for half a second. “No,” I said. “I don’t.”
The old me would have added something. A joke. A grin. A little charm to smooth out the honesty before it got too close to skin.
But I didn’t.
Lucy watched me like she was waiting for it too. When it didn’t come, something in her face shifted. Like she had expected one version of me and gotten another by mistake.
I slid my hands into my pockets because if I did not do something with them, I was going to reach for her, and I had lost the right to make any of this about what I wanted a long time ago. “Tell me where to be,” I said, “and I’ll be there.”
Her throat moved. Then she looked down at the folders in her arms.
“I’ll see you this afternoon in my office,” she said.
“My calendar already fears you.”
“Good.”
That one had less ice in it.
I nodded toward the door. “I’ll let you get back to terrifying the organization into functioning properly.”
“See you later, Ty.”
I smiled before I could stop myself. For one second, she almost did too.
Then a faint clicking sound came from the hallway. Tiny nails on polished floor. Dottie appeared in the open doorway, ears high, tail wagging like she had decided the meeting was over because she wanted a walk.
Lucy sighed. “Dottie.”
Dottie ignored her completely and trotted straight to me.
“Hey, trouble,” I cooed, scratching behind one of Dottie’s soft ears.
She sat on my shoe.
Lucy looked at her dog. “Unbelievable.”
I looked down at Dottie, then back at Lucy. “She has good instincts.”
“She eats sticky notes.”
“Complex woman.”
Dottie’s tail swept across the floor. Lucy tried not to smile. It was small and tired and gone too fast, but it was real enough to shake something loose inside me.
I had not earned much. Maybe nothing yet. But I had earned that one second.
So I did the only smart thing I had done all morning. I didn’t push. I didn’t tease her into giving me more. I didn’t make it a thing.
I just eased my foot out from under Dottie, patted her head one final time, and stepped into the hallway. “Two-thirty, Ms. Thomas.”
Lucy’s eyes stayed on mine.
Then, softer than before, she said, “Don’t be late.”
I looked at her for one second longer than I should have. “I won’t.”