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Every night like clockwork, Noah told me to “go get True” so he could get the food on the table. And every night like clockwork, I did. I didn’t know why it was so easy for me to give in to him, but that was a question not worth my time anymore. If Noah asked for it, I would probably find a way to make it happen.

True’s Camry was parked out front and the poor old car was probably thankful it hadn’t been moved since she showed up that random Thursday. She claimed she was shutting herself off from civilization to finish—or start—her book, but every time we asked her how writing went that day, she avoided our gaze and asked for more wine, more bread, moreanythingto change the subject.

Her avoidance game was almost as good as Noah’s. And his current avoidance tactic involved the woman I was going to find.

My mind flashed back to the brief conversation we had before he deflected.

“You not picking up your mom’s calls anymore. What happened?” I asked when I saw him stuff his phone in his pocket after her picture popped up three times in a row. I knew Noah’sdad wasn’t shit. And I was banned from their family functions because I called him out too many times. But his mom had always been the parent he preferred.

Instead of answering me, he shoved his hand in an oven mitt and tossed a command over his shoulder.

“Go get True, I’m gonna get everything on the table.”

So, here I was,getting her. I knocked on the screen door in front of her yellow door and waited for her to pull it open like she always did.

But the music bleeding through the walls of the small cabin told me that wasn’t happening.

Mint Condition’s “So Fine” played as I knocked for the third time.

Aside from it drowning out my arrival, True’s taste in music was fucking top tier. She favored 90s cuts and it honestly aligned with everything about her.

When I knocked for the fourth time to no answer, I opened the group chat Noah made the day after our first dinner and typed out a message.

Me:

Red, open the door.

All I got in response was a voice note from Noah.

“Ask her if she wants wine or sweet tea.”

Nothing came through from True and the song still played at the highest volume. Trying the handle on her screen door, I raised a brow when I met no resistance and it opened easily. Then I turned the knob on her front door and walked in the house.

The music was louder in here.

It vibrated through my chest and made me wonder what kind of speaker she was using.

My eyes ran over the details that screamed True more than her physical presence did.

The notebooks on every surface.

The clay mug covered in kiss stains.

The brown, leather loafers in her entryway, a few feet apart like she’d kicked them off as she was walking in the house and couldn’t be bothered to line them up.

Then my focus went to a singular point in the middle of her tiny living room.

In front of the couch that had seen better days. And beside the coffee table that was covered with a mountain of books and half-empty water bottles.

There she was.

True looked the way she did the first time I saw her. Lost between the hypnotizing notes of a ballad, oblivious to the rest of the world.

Eyes shut.

Hips swaying.

And a tender smile on her cherry red lips.