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He liked to call them up like it hadn’t been six months since his last call. Like it hadn’t been a few years since they’d seen him in person.

It was something men seemed to be able to compartmentalize. Maybe that fundamentally was why she just didn’t have very high regard for marriage. She didn’t trust men.

So she remained alone.

If she could’ve chosen her sexuality at the beginning of time, she’d have totally picked liking women. It would be way more sensible. Rather than being huddled in fraternity party closets and then getting beer spilled on her the only time she had ever really attempted something physical with a guy.

But something like that... Well. It was enough.

“It isn’t like that. Not with him. I don’t know what he’s thinking. But he’s almost like a different person. The Gideon that I know told us everything. He was always excited, interested and interesting. Not this person I can hardly get two words out of, and now he’s in town without even letting us know.”

“He is different,” Rory said, looking down.

“What does he look like?”

She looked back up at her friend. “Bearded?”

“You’re not sure if he’s bearded?”

“No. I’m sure that he’s bearded. I was just trying to decide if that was the defining characteristic.”

“Oh. Well. Bearded is a change.”

“Long hair. He’s... He’s huge. I mean, weight-lifting huge.”

“He’s always been fit.”

“Yeah, but not like this.”

Lydia grimaced. “Oh. Great, so my brother is now a long-haired, bearded guy with a gym body. There women are going to beferal.”

Rory laughed. She couldn’t help it, because at least in the middle of her very serious distress, there was this amusing distress.

And she did not tell Lydia that she had been fully immobilized with lust at the sight of her brother’s new look. Keeping that to herself was true friendship. “Well, you’ve weathered it before. You can certainly weather it again.”

“I’m going to envy you moving to Boston. My family needs me.”

“Yeah.”

“Rory...will you please check on him? I feel like he doesn’t want to see me.”

“That can’t be it.”

“It can be, actually. He’s here and he didn’t tell us.”

“I promise. I’ll check on him.”

She thought of that day she’d seen Gideon in the woods. When she’d been writing in her notebook.

Get a kiss (kiss from a stranger?).

That made her feel all trembly.

But he wasn’t a stranger, it turned out. He was Gideon.

So she wasn’t going to think about him and kissing in that context.

No, tonight she was going to bring him dinner, for her friend. That was all.