wanted to go for ice cream. “Probably,” he said. “I’m sorry.”
“No, it’s fine,” Joanna said, shaking her curly blond head. “Do you want to grab her some soup to go or something?”
Fuck, Colby hated himself. “Nah, it’s okay. I should probably just take off.”
He paid the check and took her home, the windows cracked to the chilly night air and a Kacey Musgraves album she liked on the stereo. She turned to look at him as they pulled up in front of her house. “I had a good time tonight, Colby,” she said.
Colby nodded. “Yeah,” he said, feeling like a total dickhead and not sure what to do about it, exactly. “Me too.” He knew he could kiss her, if he wanted. He knew from the way she was holding her face that she was probably hoping he would.
“I’ll text you” was all he said.
When he got home, instead of going inside he went around the back of the house and climbed the steps to the rickety wooden deck, plunking himself into a lawn chair that Tris had gnawed all the legs on back when she was a puppy. It was still a little too cold to sit out here comfortably at night, the wind stinging the back of his neck and rustling the trees out at the far end of the yard. He tucked his free hand between his thighs and dialed Meg. “Hey,” he said when she answered. “Everything okay?”
“I’m sorry,” she said, her voice a little thick and unfamiliar. He thought maybe she’d been crying again. “I’m really embarrassed.”
“Don’t be,” he said, leaning his head back. “It’s just me.”
“No, I know, but I don’t want you to think I just expect you to drop everything and talk to me just because I’m having some kind of humiliating existential crisis like you’re my therapist or something.”
“I don’t think I’m your therapist,” Colby said, frowning. “Do you think I’m your therapist?”
“No,” Meg said immediately. “Of course not. That’s the point.” She took a deep breath. “Are you mad at me?”
Colby hesitated. It didn’t feel as simple as a yes-or-no answer. “Are you mad at me?” he finally asked.
“I don’t know,” she said, which was surprising. He hadn’t thought she’d let him get away with not answering first. “I was, a little.”
“Yeah.” Colby bit his lip. “I’m not mad at you,” he said, which was true now, even if it hadn’t been twelve hours ago. He didn’t know how to tell her mad wasn’t the right word. “What’s going on?”
So Meg sighed and told him: about her dad’s wedding and her friend Emily dating her ex-boyfriend, about walking into the pizza place and realizing things were different than she’d thought. Halfway through the story, Tris started scratching at the door to come out, so Colby reached behind him and twisted the knob, watching as the dog trotted across the yard and peed on a fence post before coming back and lying down beside his chair.
“That’s totally fucked up,” he said when she was finished, though a tiny part of him was weirdly relieved to hear she probably wasn’t about to get back together with that guy any time soon. “The two of them sneaking around like that? I’d be pissed, too.”
“No, I’m not pissed,” Meg protested. “It’s fine; they’re allowed. It’s just—”
“Meg.” Colby laughed at her a little; he couldn’t help it. “It’s fucked up.”
Meg sighed loudly. “Okay,” she said. “I guess it’s a little fucked up.”
“There you go,” he said, smiling into the darkness. “Does that feel better?”
“Kind of,” she admitted. “Maybe. I don’t know.” He could hear her shifting around on the other end of the phone; he tried to picture her sitting in her frilly bedroom, wondered if she was already in her pajamas. He wanted to ask her what color her hair was, but he didn’t know how. “Enough. You tell me something now.”
Colby hesitated for a minute, looking out at the scrubby tree line at the far end of the yard and reaching down to scratch Tris on her bristly backbone. I had a date tonight, he thought and didn’t say. He wasn’t sure why he didn’t say it, exactly, except that he liked being the person she called when things were shitty. He liked being the person she told things to. And it felt like if he told her about Jo, that might go away.
“I heard a really crappy band tonight,” he said finally.
Meg smiled at that; Colby could hear it. “You did?”