“You’re thirty-two, you’re not old.”
“What about you? You’re younger than me, aren’t you?”
“By three years. You always teased me about it, even though the difference doesn’t count.” He’d pulled his chair over and sat so close to me now I could smell the sea salt, sand and sweat. I wanted to touch his cheek, run my fingers over his skin in an attempt to make sure he really was sitting here in the kitchen, but I wasn’t sure how he’d react. Before I had a chance to lift my hand, his stomach let out a piercing squeal, and I raised an eyebrow.
“Why didn’t you say you were hungry?” I said.
“I’m hungry.”
There it was, his wry, quirky sense of humor. I hadn’t understood it when we’d first met, but when he left town, it was one of the things I missed the most. As always, he was trying hard to pretend everything was fine, and I decided I’d let him because it was what he needed right now. “What can I get you?”
“What kind of food do I like?” His shoulders dropped, another smile forming on his lips. “Shit, that’s such a dumb question.”
“No, it isn’t.” I swallowed. “You know, maybe it’s an opportunity.”
“How so?” Ash crossed his arms, both eyebrows raised as he expected more of an explanation. Right then, he looked exactly how I remembered his father and it made my heart swell. Brad had been a good man, fantastic both to Mom and me. He’d never tried to overtly muscle in and assume the role of my dad, but I’d wanted him to anyway. Growing up knowing my biological one hadn’t loved me enough to stay had hurt a lot more than I’d ever wanted to admit.
“It could be a kind of blank slate,” I said, and shrugged. “Maybe you’ll develop a taste for things you didn’t like before.”
“That’s one way of looking at it, I suppose. Are you always this optimistic?”
Pushing my seat back, I said, “You relax, I’ve got frozen lasagna.”
Ash reached over and touched my fingers. “Thank you for helping me...Maya.”
The way he said my name, so guarded and with such caution, broke my heart in two and I turned away, trying to hide. Ash didn’t notice, and as he filled our glasses with water, I dug the pasta out of the freezer, unboxed it and shoved it in the microwave. “We can go shopping tomorrow,” I said over my shoulder. “I need to get more stuff anyway. I’ll show you your favorites.” He didn’t answer, and when I looked up, I caught him gaping at the window, his brow furrowed.
“Where are the chickens?”
“What chick—” My eyes widened. “You remember the chickens?”
“Were they in the garden?” he said, rubbing his temples with his fingers as if he were trying to massage the knowledge back into his head.
“They weren’t real. We had blinds with a chicken pattern.”
“Red and orange,” Ash said. “Big, fat, red-and-orange hens.”
“On a green background.” My voice went up a notch. “Brad thought they were absolutely hideous and swore us to secrecy because Mom bought the fabric and spent ages sewing them. She loved them so much, but he said they drove him clucking crazy.”
Ash actually laughed, his shoulders dropping. “This is crazy. How can I remember these bloody red-and-orange chickens but not remember you or our parents?”
“It’s a start,” I said, giving his arm a squeeze. “Baby steps, right? You don’t want to become overwhelmed.”
A while later the two of us sat at the table, Ash’s belly full while I stuck with my glass of water. My appetite hadn’t been the same since he’d left and most of the time I hadn’t seen the point in cooking for one. Ash pushed the rest of his food around his plate, and I could almost hear his mind whirring, trying, and failing, to get traction as he covered a yawn with one hand.
“It’s late, Ash. Why don’t you go clean up and try to get some rest? We’ll talk more in the morning. The clothes you left are still upstairs in your room, and your bed’s made.” I wondered if he’d ask why I’d regularly laundered his sheets and made up his bed again when I hadn’t heard from him in two years, but he didn’t.
“Could you show me?” he said quietly instead.
“Of course. Come.”
I led him across the black-and-white diamond-tiled foyer and up the creaky, dark-stained wooden stairs that used to have a dollar-bill-green runner with golden stair rods. The carpet had bunched so badly we’d ripped it out. Replacing it was another renovation project I’d put on hold. Motivation, not time, had been lacking. Not to mention the cash.
At the top of the landing I pointed to each of the doors as we walked by. “This is mine, the one on the left is the spare. That’s the bathroom, and this one’s the main bedroom. You took it after...after...Brad died.”
Ash didn’t reply, and I couldn’t tell what he was thinking as he flicked on the light and stepped inside the room. It was exactly as it had been the day he’d left. A double bed with a blue-and-white-striped duvet cover. A wooden clock he’d made and a cluster of family photos on the wall, my favorite a selfie of the two of us he’d taken when we’d gone snowtubing one winter, our cheeks and noses pink from the cold. Ash had never been one for clutter, and his bedside table was bare, save for a digital alarm clock, a blue lamp and a deck of cards. The only other items were his refurbished wooden desk and the empty chair standing in front of it. I walked to the closet and pulled it open, revealing a few pairs of folded pants, T-shirts and sweaters.
“You’ll find something in here. They’ll still fit you, I’m sure. I’ll set
