days, of staring blankly at scribbled notes and computer screens, enough of thinking about Nora’s skin and her smell. He didn’t want mess like this; he never had. Up ahead, the exit doors promised a colorful sunset, and that was a time of day he ought to celebrate, because it didn’t make him think of Nora at all.
“Would it be odd, do you think,” Abraham said, which is right about when Will realized he hadn’t ever responded. “If I also gave her one?”
Will stopped in front of the exit doors, turned and blinked down at Abraham, breaking the long-unspoken eye contact rules. “If you . . . gave her a kitten?”
Abraham smoothed his lapel. “Yes. As a gesture.”
A gesture of what, Abraham didn’t say, but despite the sock history /hamster??? brain sluggishness, Will had enough of his wits about this to see it for what it was. Gerald Abraham was trying to reconcile with his ex-wife, and wanted Will’s advice. Truly a reckless move. What did Will know about reconciliation? He’d never tried such a thing in his life, because it’d never been necessary. You never needed to have a breakup if you never let things go beyond a night or two, if you only shared those nights with people who also weren’t looking for anything more.
Still, that lapel-smoothing. It got right in there, up against that cracked glass in Will’s chest. He took a breath and thought about Quincy and Francis, who were in fact enjoyable to look at on a phone screen but a lot of work outside of that.
“Two is enough,” he said, and Abraham nodded gravely, looking toward the doors Will was about to go out.
“You could maybe get her something from a pet store,” he added. “Supplies. A gift card.”
“I often bought her gift cards. During our marriage.”
Will winced. “Don’t do that, then.”
A memory of two weeks, two days ago came back to him, something he’d said to Nora in the dark, confessional solace of her bedroom: I’m not even sure I ever learned how to be a good friend. Definitely he and Gerald Abraham weren’t friends, and definitely Will would never be finding himself in this particular situation—broken up, lonely enough to be coming up with cat-purchasing schemes, looking for advice from the nearest person you knew the name of.
But that didn’t mean he couldn’t offer something.
“You ought to go see her,” he said, putting his hand on the door handle. He’d help, but then he had to get the hell out of here. This was uncomfortable enough that he thought he might be blushing. “If you—if pets weren’t your thing, I mean. Going to see hers, that would be a nice gesture.”
Abraham tucked his hands in the pockets of his white coat, and Will wondered if he was going to get out his notebook and write this down. Maybe he would, once Will left, but for now he simply looked at Will, gave him a curt nod, and said, “Very good,” as though Will had offered up a satisfactory diagnosis and treatment plan. He added a brief, “Enjoy your evening,” and then turned and walked away.
Will shook his head, pushing out the door. In spite of himself, he felt a smile tug at his lips, thinking about Gerald Abraham getting climbed all over by Quincy and Francis. A rogue urination and follow-up face scream wouldn’t be the worst thing. But as he stepped into the evening air, the smile faded. You ought to go see her, his rash, reckless, cracked-glass heart told him, and he was so tired of it. Tired of wanting what he shouldn’t want. Tired of missing what he shouldn’t miss.
Tired enough that when he looked up, he thought he might be dreaming.
Because that was Nora Clarke, standing there waiting for him.
“I was pretty sure I missed you.”
It was the first thing she said to him once he’d crossed the parking lot to get to where she stood, her cheeks flushed pink and her hair in that loose braid he liked, the one that made his forearm prickle in remembered awareness. She said it with the kind of frazzled, slightly out-of-breath frustration of a person who’d been dealing with traffic for a while, but he heard it all wrong, of course, and for long seconds all he could think was, I’m sure I missed you.
“I remembered you said you sometimes worked six to six,” she rushed out, obviously discomfited by the long silence, “And so I took a chance on