Page 40 of A Million Times, Yes

“What if I had a better idea?”

She stretched her arms over her head and behind her back. “Like what?”

“Breakfast.”

“Breakfast?” she mocked. “Now?”

We’d never been out to eat together; the food, on both nights, had been delivered to the hotel room. If I took her out to dinner, there was a solid chance I’d be recognized. I never went anywhere without a fan coming up to take a picture or to ask for an autograph. That couldn’t happen with Maya. But if we went to breakfast at this hour, there was far less worry that that would happen.

“Are you telling me you’re not hungry? Because I fucked every calorie out of your body last night, and you should be empty at this point.”

Her cheeks reddened as she smiled. “You and your way with words ...”

“Well?”

She crossed her arms. “I’m actually quite hungry, yes.”

I reached for her hand. “There’s a diner on the next street.” I walked her to the end of the block, and when we reached the entrance to the restaurant, I held the door open and followed in behind her. “Two,” I said to the waitress as she walked by with a coffeepot.

“Sit anywhere,” she replied. “Menus are clipped behind the salt and pepper shakers.”

I led Maya to a seat in the back—away from the windows—and took the spot across from her.

“Have you been here before?” she asked.

I handed her a menu, remembering the last time I’d been here over summer break when I was still in college after partying at the bars all night. “A long time ago. You?”

“Never, but I bet they have good pancakes.”

“Why would you think that?”

“All diners have good pancakes. It’s a thing.”

In the last couple of days, since Maya had been fucking consuming me, the walls of my structure had crumbled. I wasn’t even sleeping at home anymore. So switching up my breakfast of three hard-boiled eggs, avocado, and cottage cheese on sourdough bread—the same meal I’d eaten for years—seemed almost normal at this point.

I put the menu back behind the salt and pepper. “I’m going to test your theory.”

“I’m going to join you.” She returned her menu, too, and placed her hands on top of mine in the middle of the table, her nails gently tracing the backs of my fingers. “When we parted ways yesterday after our run, were you going to work?”

I nodded, unsure if this conversation was going to lead to a place of honesty.

“Where’s your office?”

“What, are you going to visit me there?” I smiled, knowing I was playing with fucking fire.

“Maybe.”

“It’s in the Back Bay.”

A building my father had purchased over thirty years ago. At the time, it had been four stories tall, and he rented out the bottom two floors. After multiple renovations and additions, it now sat at thirty-six stories, and we filled every crevice of the high-rise.

“I don’t venture over to that area all that often, but I’d make an exception for you.”

Fortunately, the waitress came to our table, cutting the conversation short. She pulled a pen out of her hair and held it to a pad of paper as she asked, “What can I get you?”

“We’re both going to have pancakes,” I told her.

As she wrote, she said, “And to drink?”