Tiny lines creased at his eyes. He licked his lips, a sign I was coming to recognize in him. It was his way of preparing to say something difficult. But he didn’t say whatever was on his mind. He took another drink. Two. And then cleared his throat. “So, tell me, what do you do when you’re not floating in a pool and eating truffle turds on a Caribbean island?” I blinked. With the exception of our aborted conversations about Marlee and that bit about his mother, we hadn’t touched on anything real. I wasn’t sure I wanted to go there. Wasn’t sure I wanted to even remember where I’d come from, where I’d lived less than a day ago. The whirlwind of my life, the constant pressure, the ever-hovering sword of doom…it all seemed so far away. And I liked it that way. On the other hand, his question was genuine. The interest in his eyes, sincere. Maybe I did want to go there, for a bit, if only to share it with him.
