I BARREL OUT of the bathroom and smash into Miles, who’s been waiting in the hallway like a nervous first-time father pacing the hospital floors.
“You’re still in it,” he says.
“It’s stuck,” I say. “I think I broke the zipper, and the dress is too tight, and I can’t breathe, and it’s stuck.”
“It’s okay.”
“Oh, is it?” I say. “Then I feel better.”
He’s turning me by the elbow. “I’ll get it. Just try to breathe.” He gathers my hair off my neck so carefully his fingers never brush skin. “Can you hold this out of the way?”
I pin my hair against the back of my head, shoulders and arms throbbing as my heart pumps too much blood to my extremities.
Miles pinches the two sides of the fabric and wiggles the zipper until it gives. At midback, it catches. “Shit. Hold on.”
More pinching, wiggling, straining. I close my eyes and focus on my breath.
The zipper goes up and glides down to the same snag.
“Try to stay still,” he says.
“You keep pulling me off balance,” I say.
“Do you have any ChapStick?” he asks.
“Can your mouth moisturization wait a minute?” I cry.
“Nah, not really—it’s for the zipper, Daphne.”
“In the medicine cabinet,” I tell him. We shuffle together into the cramped bathroom, him holding up the back of my dress as we go. I hand the tube to him and he does whatever it is he thinks he’s going to do with it, then goes back to wrestling the zipper.
He loses purchase and smacks an elbow into the wall behind me with a grunt of pain. “It’s too cramped in here.”
We shuffle-step back into the hall. He tries again, his frustrated huff turning into a laugh.
“What?” I ask over my shoulder.
“Now I can’t see anything.” He drags me by the skirt through his bedroom door, bumping the lights on.
“Can you lean over the dresser?” he asks.
“Seriously?” I say.
“I need more leverage,” he says, “and every time I pull, you come with me.”
Dear god, what did I do to deserve this?
Oh, right. I lied about being in a relationship with this man, then jumped his bones at a lavender farm to upset my ex-fiancé. That could’ve done it.
I brace my hands against the top of his dresser. He sets one palm to my hip, holding me steady while he pulls again, gets the zipper to move for several blissful millimeters before it catches again, his grip on me tightening.
“Distract me,” I say under my breath.
“I promise we’ll get this off of you,” he says.
Wrong kind of distraction.
“I’m feeling unbearably stupid right now, Miles, so you’re going to have to do better than that. Tell me something awful.”
He laughs. “Okay. What about this: when Petra and I got your save-the-date in the mail, she told me she didn’t want to get married, and I was like, Cool, no worries. Because I thought she meant in general, not specifically that she didn’t want to marry me.”
I drop my face toward the dresser. My pained groan gives way to something more forceful, the emotion shaking through my shoulders.
“Shit,” he says. “I’m sorry. Not helpful.” Miles takes hold of both my hips. “Hey.”
I straighten up, shaking my head as the laughter racks me, tears leaking from my eyes.
“Daphne,” he murmurs behind me, still tender and sweet, pulling me in, my back to his chest, and coiling his arms around my waist.
“Miles,” I finally manage, spinning in his grip. “What was the ChapStick for?” Another fit of laughter throttles my voice.
He registers it. His mouth opens and closes. “I thought it might smooth the track.”
“You lubed my zipper,” I say.
“Actually,” he says, “I very specifically asked about ChapStick so that neither of us would have to say that sentence.”
My forehead hits his collarbone as the giggles double me over. His hand slides up my back, goose bumps trailing along behind his touch, to rest at the base of my neck. His laugh hums through me too.
“You were just ready for that,” I say. “How many roommates have you had to do this for?”
“Dozens.” His arms loosen and he turns me again. “But you’re the first who had ChapStick.” He pinches the zipper and gives a soft tug.
After all that huffing and struggling and bracing, the zipper glides down to the small of my back, Miles’s knuckles dragging along my skin all the way.
I shiver at the sensation, prickle with full-body awareness of him.
He doesn’t pull away immediately, and I catch my weight shifting back into his touch. His fingers unfurl, his palm flattening against my low back.
The bodice of the dress is gaping loose, gravity pulling the straps down my arms as the weight of the skirt draws everything toward the ground.
I catch the bust against my chest, pinning it to me as I turn toward him. “Thanks.”
“Here.” He flinches away from me, avoids my eyes as he snatches a loose gray T-shirt from his open top drawer. When he pulls it over my head, his gingersnap smell engulfs me, and he tugs it down over the dress.
When I let go of the bust, the whole lacy concoction pools at my feet. I get my arms through the T-shirt sleeves, and Miles helps me step out of the skirt, gently untucking my hair from the collar.
His eyes lift back to mine, and the room thrums. “Thank you,” I say again, this time a whisper.
“I’m going to need this back,” he teases quietly. “That’s been my favorite shirt since I was ten.”
I register the front of it for the first time: a crackly vinyl cartoon camel smoking a gigantic cigarette. Chortling, I meet his gaze. “This is your favorite shirt from childhood? A walking nicotine advertisement?”
His smile widens. His fingers move absently to my chin, and I feel myself being drawn into him, our stomachs connecting, his heart pattering through me. “It’s a camel, Daphne,” he says wryly. “In sunglasses.”
“I’ll change immediately,” I say, playing along.
“No, no,” he says. “Keep it as long as you want. What’s mine is yours.”
I suppress a grin. “See, this is why all these locals have added you to their wills.”
He frowns. “Sometimes you make it sound like I’m a snake-oil salesman.”
I grab his arm. “That’s not what I mean at all.”
“Then what do you mean,” he asks.
“I mean that you’re nice,” I say.
He laughs. “This again.”
“I mean,” I say, more fervently, “you’re probably the only person I’ve ever met who’s genuinely curious about everyone he meets. And makes them feel interesting and welcome, and like—like they should be confident in what they do. You make them feel like growing corn or making cherry salsa or recommending books is a superpower.”
“If you’re good at those things,” he says, “it is.”
“Exactly,” I murmur. “That’s how you actually feel.”
The only other person I’ve ever known with that particular skill wields it like a shield. Or a tax he’s paying you, a cut of him just big and bright enough to guarantee you won’t ask for more.
“I just think,” I say to Miles, “you like people almost as much as they like you. And it makes being around you feel like—like standing in sunlight.”
His mouth softens. Briefly, he studies the space between our feet. “You feel like sunlight too.”
I snort. “No, I don’t.”
“No,” he agrees. “You don’t. You’re more like Lake Michigan.”
“Cold and bracing,” I say.
His voice drops: “Cool and refreshing.”
“Shocking and painful,” I say.
“Surprising and exciting,” he counters, now close enough that I smell the postshift glass of red wine on his breath. Close enough that I become the moth to his irresistible glow, trying to resist the pull to move closer.
I tip my head toward the living room, the mess, mine and Julia’s. I seize the opportunity for a distraction from this heady feeling. “Have you managed to talk to her? About what she’s really doing here?”
He exhales heavily with a half step back. “I’ve tried. She’s still pretending there’s no big reason other than scraping me up off the floor.” He forces a smile that makes my heart feel like it’s folding in half. “You ready to kick her out?”
“I like having her here,” I promise.
He nods.
“Can I do anything?” I ask.
Now his smile softens. He touches my chin again. “Nah,” he says. “This is enough.”
“I’m not doing anything,” I point out.
The corner of his mouth twitches. “Then why do I feel better?”
The moment swells. Now I step back, the floor chilly beneath my soles. “Thanks again,” I say, “for lubing my zipper.”
“Anytime,” he says.
