Chapter Six

Wake the mouse, don’t let it sleep. Wake the mouse, don’t let it sleep. Wake the mouse, don’t let it sleep.

Mark let the mantra run on loop in his head. He wasn’t sure he fully got what he needed to do, but he liked the mouse analogy, and he often did his best not to startle people. With Shaina, he’d focus on the startling, knowing that’s what she needed. Because he didn’t like being a pest, but that desire flipped when he interacted with her.

They made their way into the store, heading to the gum section, looking for a pack that involved “warm smiles.”

“Do they want us to buy gum, is that it?” Mark asked, not needing to be loud because the frustration did it for him.

“No, the rules say take a picture, though how do you really take a picture with a stick of gum?” Shaina picked up a random pack, cupped it near her face, and gave a model-worthy smile.

She looked good—beautiful, in fact—and he was tempted to take a picture, not for the contest but for reasons he couldn’t fathom. Then she gasped, staring over his shoulder, saving him from whatever weird vibe possessed him.

“It’s not the gum.” She pointed and he followed to the wall, where a poster featured a couple smiling with white teeth, and advertising a stick of gum. “It’s the poster!” Shaina squealed and headed toward it at the front of the store, near the window, adding her own white-toothed grin to the pair. Mark took out his phone and snapped the picture.

Shaina scowled. “What was that for, we’re both supposed to be in the shot.”

He scratched his neck, not sure what possessed him to take the photo. “Right, sorry.” He moved beside her, doing his best to mimic her enthusiastic smile as she took the appropriate shot. The image on the screen showed two people who appeared to enjoy the other’s company, and something clicked in the back of his mind.

“This is their social media picture.” He started scrolling, then held up his phone to Lena’s profile, where she and Aaron sported cheesy grins under the poster.

“Damn, good detective skills, Goldman,” Shaina said. “That explains the random gum stop.”

Indeed it did. Mark pondered if they’d get extra points for realizing the reference.

They returned to her car and checked out the next clue: Whether touring foliage or visiting the North Pole, this stop will appeal to both young and old.

“That’s vague,” Shaina said.

Mark went to speak, then remembered his mantra and forced himself to talk louder than normal. “Not really, remember the time we did the Polar Express?”

Shaina laughed. “Right, four Jewish kids who had already finished Hanukah.”

He nodded and made sure his voice didn’t drop. “Right. At the local train station.”

Her eyes lit up and she pumped her palm against the steering wheel. “You are absolutely correct. Point Mark.”

He leaned in to her. “Does that mean I’m winning our individual challenge?”

She rolled her eyes, but that model smile remained. She gently pushed his shoulder. “The competition is still young, don’t get cocky. No, actually, do get cocky, that ensures you mess up and I win.”

He leaned back. “You wish.”

She eyed him and he nearly repeated himself, but she had no pinched eyebrows and her face remained open. Like they had a moment. Like they liked each other for a change.

Weird.

The radio came back on, but quieter this time, as Shaina drove, as though maybe they could actually have a conversation over the music. Mark stuck to the quiet, noting that for the first time, it didn’t feel so weighted.

At the train station, they exited the car, walking up and down the long stretch of station and track, searching for the optimal location for their picture. Something that said they were at the correct spot and not just any random track point in the area. A group of tourists stood nearby, a centered speaker trying to reach the crowd. Mark didn’t want to disturb them, so he lowered his voice. “Maybe we need a listing of events, because the clue mentioned two of them.”

Shaina didn’t react. Dammit. He touched her arm, repeating a bit louder, and the happy expression on her face faded fast away, revealing the scowling, pinched-eyebrow version of her he knew well.

She rubbed her temples and one strong vibe came off her: exhaustion. “Do you know how much I’ve had to guess, or ignore, or piece together today?” He opened his mouth to speak but she held up a hand. “Not including you? It’s a daily occurrence, it encompasses every single spoken interaction I have. And it’s a rare day when the speaker takes any responsibility for the communication. So forgive me if I’m tapped out before lunch and don’t have the energy to constantly try to understand you.”

Which meant he was still too quiet. By trying to be mindful of the group, he ignored the needs of the person he was with, the person who mattered more than random tourists. He pulled her away from the group to reduce their noise bothering her, and his noise bothering them, and repeated the mantra, wake the mouse.

“I’m sorry. This is new to me, but that’s no excuse for putting you through something you’ve clearly dealt with all our lives. I’m trying here and I have no intention of leaving you with the responsibility. And considering the past thirty-two years, I’ve got a lot of one-sided catching up to do.”

A half smile crossed her face. “Life hasn’t shown me that you’ll succeed.”

He took a step closer to her, not to be heard but for, well, he wasn’t quite sure. “You haven’t met my single-minded determination for success.”

Now the half smile became a full one. “I think the PhD gives me a clue.”

“So don’t count me out until I’ve had a chance to prove myself.”

Shaina crossed her arms. “Okay. But don’t expect me to wait another thirty years for you to get it right.”

“I won’t even need thirty days.”

“And there’s the cocky attitude again.”

“That attitude is what’s going to win this event for us. And taking the picture with the station schedule will satisfy both sides of the clue.”

Shaina followed his pointer finger to the listing he mentioned. “Okay, hotshot. Take the picture then.” She handed over her phone and he took it from her, snapping the shot with her looking at him, an expression on her face he hoped meant she’d give him a chance to fix this communication failure.

With any luck, he wouldn’t let her down.

…

“Oh, the ice cream parlor we always used to beg our parents to stop at! The one with the large ice cream cone out front. Is this entire scavenger hunt a landmark picture-taking challenge?” Shaina said to Mark.

Three scavenger stops later, they stood outside her car, the hot, late-summer breeze ruffling her bangs into her eyes. She shook them aside.

“Looks like. If I didn’t know Aaron enjoyed this area as much as Lena did, I would guess that Lena and Noah went down memory lane.”

Since the train station, where Shaina could not hear Mark at all, he’d been louder, more consistent. She’d never met a person who was able to make the changes he’d now done. It had her studying him more, wanting to know him better. Because it was one thing to have Carrie gush about how caring Mark was, quite another to see it in action.

Hearing people never changed the way they spoke for long. What made him different and able to accomplish the impossible?

She didn’t have the answer, didn’t know if one existed. Only that Mark could somehow communicate her.

They piled into the car, began the short drive to the ice cream shop. A few minutes later, the large structure loomed ahead, and she blinked at how different it appeared. As a kid, it had made her mouth water. Now it had cracks in it, a few streaks, and apparently struggled to recover from a graffiti incident.

“Huh, that used to look appetizing,” Mark said.

She turned his way. “I was thinking the same thing.”

They exited the car and headed for the oversized wooden ice cream cone. The waffle cone base had a chip near the top, the vanilla ice cream had three mounds with fudge poured on and a faded cherry on top missing its stem. Shaina squinted, trying to figure out if this was a kid’s version of beer goggles or if it truly had looked different twenty years ago.

And then the ramification hit her and she nearly groaned.

“What’s wrong?” Mark asked.

“Was I making a face?”

He held up his thumb and pointer finger close together in the “little bit” gesture.

“Just realizing the last time we would have stopped would have been about twenty years ago. I feel old.”

Mark shoved his hands into his pockets, looking around. “Time is a funny thing. It moves fast then slow, even though it’s one of the most consistent things out there.”

“Little deep for a scavenger hunt.”

He shrugged.

She faced the structure. “I had been thinking pretending to lick it would be funny, but now that I see it…” She angled the camera to catch the two of them and the large monstrosity, then clicked the camera app with Mark still looking at her. “There, done.”

“That can’t look good. We should get ice creams and eat something that looks better than this for the picture.”

“One, you don’t eat ice cream, you lick it. Two, that’s called wasting time. If you want ice cream, we can do that after we win.”

He stared at her, an expression on his face she didn’t know how to read. Her words came back to her, the practical offer to spend more time together outside of this competition. And her usage of the word “lick.” Words had never held a double meaning between them. And that word at an ice cream parlor made total, non-sexual sense. Yet the way the light made Mark’s hair appear a softer shade of brown and how it accentuated the strength in his arms, all of that brought on the double meaning.

She swallowed, and suddenly a refreshing ice cream sounded like a very good idea. His expression didn’t change, though, so she didn’t know if his thoughts mirrored hers or if the heat of the sun had gotten to her.

That was it. The heat of the sun. Nothing else. No way would she develop feelings for the man, not when their parents had dressed her as a bride and him as a groom when they were babies. No attraction. Nothing. Mark was a no-cross zone.

They headed back to the car and read the next question.

An hour later they took the final cheesy photo, each pointing to the “Goldman/Zalecki Private Party” sign. Shaina scrolled through, working on compiling them all for easy access.

“Is it weird,” she asked Mark, “your little sister getting married?”

Mark shrugged, hands deep in his pockets. “Not really. I kinda expected it.”

Shaina looked up from her phone, watching him. “Not looking for love?”

“Something like that. More, my work demands a lot from me and that’s not always conducive to a relationship. I’m happy for her. And I could ask the same question of you.”

That halted her picture-gathering process. “Me?”

“The four of us grew up together. The youngest getting married first.”

Shaina laughed. “True. I guess we Fogels are picky.” She grinned, and Mark grinned back, and she had to force herself to return to the pictures.

Picky was an understatement. She had a very specific, high set of standards. Olivia tried to counsel it out of her multiple times, but she hadn’t budged. She knew what she wanted—love and competition to go hand in hand. As simple and complicated as that.

They made their way over to the final spot, finding Lena alone at a table. “That looks boring,” Shaina said when they got close.

Lena glanced up and grinned, showing off her teeth. “We’re taking shifts and Aaron’s getting me a coffee from the shop downtown that I absolutely love, not boring at all.” She narrowed her eyes, glancing back and forth between the two. “Are you two done?”

Mark slapped the paper to the table in front of her. “We’re done.”

“Please tell me we’re the first,” Shaina said.

Lena pulled the paper in front of her. “You are first.”

Shaina hooted, the thrill of nailing a competition tingling in her bones. The siblings shot her a look, an identical one at that. “What? It is a competition.” She would not feel bad for this, not when she always had to fight for her wins. All of them, all the way back to the first games she played with Noah.

Lena laughed. “That doesn’t mean you got the answers right.” She held out her hand. “Gimme your proof.”

Shaina handed over her phone and Lena scrolled through, marking up their paper. She turned the phone around at one point, showing the gum poster photo. “Careful, you almost look like a couple here, tsk, tsk.”

“Why is a random poster part of your social media profile?” Mark asked.

Lena put her phone down, a secret smile on her face. “The official proposal story involved a candlelight dinner, very romantic. The unofficial story involved a pack of gum in a small convenience store.”

Shaina melted. Aaron wasn’t the most romantic person out there, but he pulled through where it mattered. “Aww, but why didn’t you tell me that before!”

Lena shrugged. “Aaron already had the dinner planned, he just couldn’t help himself, and he wanted the official story to be the one people knew.”

“I kinda like the real story better.”

Lena’s smile grew. “So do I.”

Shaina wasn’t jealous of someone younger than her getting married. Been there, done that, had the bridesmaid dresses to prove it. But the look on Lena’s face, knowing that a random, mundane moment had caused Aaron to go against plans, needing to ask her right then and there? That represented an emotion she’d never known, something she wanted to feel one day.

Competition and love, hand in hand. She’d find it somewhere.

Lena gave Shaina’s phone back to her. “Not bad, you two, not bad.”

“So, did we win?” Mark asked.

“If no one does better than you.”

“We’ll take that challenge.”

Shaina turned to see her cousin Drew and his husband Ruben join them. Two insanely good-looking men, they made such a cute couple together. Both dressed as usual, Drew in chino shorts and a button-down, short-sleeved top, Ruben in jeans and a black T-shirt with some sort of writing on it, that she’d be able to see if he wasn’t also wearing a baby contraption holding their nine-month-old daughter, Daphne. The baby flailed her arms, encouraging her fathers on. Daphne shared Ruben’s Columbian heritage, part of the reason the pair thrilled at adopting her.

Shaina crossed her arms. “You’re too late.”

Drew handed Lena the paper. “Unless you’ve messed up.”

Lena cooed at the baby, tickling the little girl’s feet. “Okay, second team, show me your proof. And it better involve some of this cutie.”

Ruben handed over his phone. “You know this little diva wouldn’t be left behind.”

“How did you manage to be so fast and deal with getting a baby in and out of the car?” Shaina asked.

Drew laughed. “Magic, practice, and muscles.” He flexed. “What are you two even doing in this competition?”

“Excuse me?” Mark asked, standing up tall and sliding in next to Shaina. His body heat warmed her side, and the sensation was so foreign, so not Mark, that she didn’t know what to do with herself.

“We’re stressed-out parents far overdue for a vacation. You two are… What are you?”

Shaina turned toward Mark. What were they?

“A team is a team. And it is her brother sponsoring the trip.”

“Team,” Ruben said, using air quotes. “No kid, neither one of you.”

Mark pushed his glasses up his nose. “For two years I worked seventy-plus hours a week, working my ass off to save everyone.”

They were close enough she felt the stiffness in Mark’s shoulders, the weight and stress he must have been under. And knew that pandemic life returning to normal had a lot to do with research scientists.

“Okay, not bad, you two,” Lena said, handing the phone back to Ruben.

“Did we beat these childless beings?” Drew asked.

Lena mimed a zipper across her lips. “All will be revealed later.”

“Brat,” Shaina muttered. “Don’t you two have babysitters for kid-free moments?”

“Who needs babysitters when we have cousins?” Drew lifted the baby out of the harness and dropped her into Shaina’s arms. Then they started walking away.

“Hey!” Shaina adjusted the girl, who giggled and clutched her shirt. “What are you doing?”

“Oh, right, forgot.” Ruben jogged over, draped a diaper bag over Shaina’s shoulder, then waved. “Daddy will see you later.”

“Drew! Ruben! You can’t just leave your daughter with someone!” Shaina called.

Drew blew a kiss. “Not someone. Cousin. We’re in room 204, bring her back in an hour.”

“In an hour what are you going to… Oh.” She shifted Daphne. “Guess I’m stuck with you for an hour.”

Lena laughed. “They totally got you.”

“Yeah, yeah.” She waved to the Goldman siblings. “I guess I’ll see you both later.”

…

Mark watched Shaina walk away. Even weighed down with the baby and the bag, she had a sway to her walk, like a runway model or a woman who knew how to lure people in.

“I suspect the scavenger hunt went better than the car ride.” Lena’s voice held a teasing note.

“All things considered.” He turned to Lena. “Do I talk like I’m trying not to wake a mouse?”

Lena snorted, doubling over the table. “Did Shaina say that?”

Mark nodded.

She rocked a hand back and forth. “Perhaps.”

“I’m trying to be louder so she can hear.” He rubbed his neck. “I feel like I’m yelling.”

“Can I join you two on the next one, or send a camera person, because this is comedic gold material.”

He grabbed the chair next to her. “Not comedy… Well, not much. Mostly figuring out your verses.”

“Right. Then why did you watch her leave and continue after she was gone?”

Mark opened his mouth. Closed it. He hadn’t meant to do that, had he? “Don’t turn into Mom, it means nothing.”

Lena leaned forward, eye to eye, noses nearly touching. “For you, if true, it does.”

She had him there and she knew it. The difference being, he really didn’t think there was anything to hold meaning. So he noticed Shaina; he hadn’t had a chance to before. That didn’t mean it would grow beyond that. “Today was the first day I kinda sorta got to know the woman. I’m still amazed she’s not scowling and annoying me.”

“Riiight,” Lena’s voice trailed off with disbelief. “Not so deserving of the ‘dragon’ label now, is she?”

Mark got her assumption. Lena was one of the few who understood his demisexuality. Attraction didn’t come easily for him. In fact, he barely needed two hands to count the number of people he’d felt sexual attraction to in his life. Add in a demanding job and limited social interactions, along with a fast-moving world that insisted attraction could form in the time it took to swipe a picture, and he didn’t exactly date much.

Made for long months with his hand. He’d tried one-night stands, managed to succeed at one or two. But without attraction it didn’t rev his engine like he hoped.

So if he truly looked at Shaina as more than the so-called dragon kid from his youth, then there would be trouble. Because he had a hard enough time with the dating pool as it was—he didn’t need to waste attraction on someone who would never be interested in him. Especially with someone his mother had been hoping he’d fall for since the doctor announced he was a boy.

He looked again at the path Shaina had taken.

No. It wasn’t attraction.

He wouldn’t let it be.