Page 45 of Heartstring

“Me too, my friend, me too.”

“Hey, I hear Seymour dropped by to visit,” he says.

“A visitor usually goes home at the end of the day. He’s moved himself in, and now I have no clue how to get rid of him.”

“Ouch, that hurts.”

I look up to find Seymour leaning against the kitchen door. He clearly overheard the conversation.

“That Tanner?” he asks.

I nod.

He stretches out his hand, and I pass him the phone.

“Hey, big guy. I have to come home to take care of some stuff. How about I come over, and we have a good old catch-up?” Seymour asks. I close my laptop and walk away.

I’m far too close to Seymour and Tanner to want to hear the details of their occasional hookups.

Stan follows me to the living room and drapes himself over me when I sit on the couch.

“What do you say, Stan? Any idea who made that generous donation? Or how they’d know the account details?”

Stan licks my hand.

“You’re no help, buddy.” He whines his reply.

“Tanner told me about the deposit,” Seymour says, coming into the room and placing my phone on the coffee table. “You really have no idea who it is? Don’t you recognize the name on the reference?”

I shake my head. My eyes land on one of the photos I have on the bookshelf. It was taken on my eighteenth birthday. We’d had so much fun at the diner and almost forgot how sick my dad was. The waiter asked if we wanted her to take a photo when they brought out a stack of pancakes with a candle.

Just before she took the photo, Mik grabbed one of the pancakes and stuffed it in my mouth. My dad laughed so hard that he ended up with his eyes closed.

“Porter found that photo among my things and said we should put it up,” I say.

“He never saw him as competition. We all have a past, and Mik happens to be yours. Your dad’s face in that photo is priceless. Maybe that’s why Porter liked it. It’s a moment of happiness among hard times, and it should be remembered.”

I smile. “Porter always wished he’d met my dad. I think they’d have got along well.”

“Because they both hated your cooking?”

He’s lucky I have nothing close by to throw at him and knock the smile off his face.

“Seymour, what if I told you Mik isn’t really in the past?”

He stares at me. “What do you mean?”

“He turned up at the soup kitchen last week. I don’t know what he was doing there. I walked out, but he followed me, and then he kissed me.”

“Wait, what?”

Stan must sense my anxiety telling Seymour what happened because he sits up and licks my face. I rub his ears, and he settles again.

“You kissed him? He’s here? Fuck, I don’t even know which question to ask first.”

I stand and walk to the window, running my hands through my hair, which reminds me I need a cut soon.

“We kinda argued because I can’t see him. I can’t be around him or speak to him.”