Chapter Two

It’s not that Daniel thinks of Tony constantly after he drives his perfectly functioning car back across the Kingston-Rhinecliff Bridge. He’s not like that; even as a teenager, he was pretty chill about crushes and boyfriends, more practical than anything else.

Definitely not someone who has impromptu make-out sessions with a stranger in broad daylight in their place of work.

That’s probably why he finds himself thinking of it every now and again, like a song stuck in his head. It was unusual; it was risky. Sure, Daniel’s met guys at bars or clubs and gone home with them in the past, but that’s what you expect to do at bars and clubs. You don’t expect to randomly hook up with a mechanic at an auto workshop. It was so far out of the wheelhouse of Daniel’s regular behavior that it thrills him in hindsight to think of it. It’s not so much about Tony, he decides, as it is about himself and this unprecedented ability for spontaneity.

Not that Tony wasn’t great, of course.

He was really handsome, actually. The mustache was kind of unique, but the long hair in a ponytail at the back of his head, the close-shorn sides, the warm brown eyes, the nice ass… It wasn’t like he had six-pack abs or perfect features, but Daniel is impressed someone like that had gone for him. Outside of drunken hookups in his undergrad years, Daniel is pretty aware his most attractive feature is his brain. He’s not a troll or anything; he’s average.

It’s flattering, that’s all.

Maybe it shouldn’t still be flattering or thrilling to think about three weeks later, but Daniel can’t quite help that it is. He’s not obsessing or anything, but when he hears an engine rev loudly somewhere behind the rickety row of old stone buildings that house most of the literature faculty as well as the social scientists, he can’t help but grin at the memory it invokes.

“What’s got you so happy?” Colette Ravel, anthropology professor and Daniel’s downstairs neighbor, asks.

Daniel coughs. “Sorry. Just thinking.”

“I hope it’s about how to get our students around the Hudson Valley without us having to drive them.” She leans back in her creaky office chair, eyebrows raised. He’s so envious of her easy poise. She looks like a professor, even though, like him, she’s barely past thirty. Maybe it’s her style; it seems she has an endless supply of slinky, silky blouses in jewel tones that pop against her dark skin. She wears them with high-waisted slacks and understated jewelry, and somehow, she always looks relentlessly professional, elegant, and competent.

Daniel has two pairs of work pants he doesn’t hate, and if he ruins one in a way he can’t fix, he’s fucked.

“Ugh,” he groans. “Why are there no car-sharing apps on campus?”

“Because Lobell is barely a real place,” Colette returns seamlessly. “I had three books go missing in the mail before I started ordering them to my home address instead of to the office.”

“Okay, but is that the mail or is that buildings and grounds?”

“Shh,” Colette admonishes. “If you say that too loud, they’ll hear you.”

“Anyway, the only reason you get your books now is because I always sign for your packages.”

“Yeah, well, you spend way too much time at home.” She shrugs. “Sorry for having a life.”

It’s a terrible Americanism absolutely butchered by her French accent. He tries not to be insulted by the content as well because she’s not wrong.

There just isn’t a lot to do in Rhinebeck, and Daniel doesn’t love socializing enough to drive a half hour to Germantown to attend the opening of an obscure documentary in the freezing cold independent theater with Colette and Mario from the film department. The last time he did, it was about some horrific Welsh myth involving horse skulls, and he had to drive home alone in the dark, and he couldn’t sleep for hours.

Worse yet, he could take the train down to the city on the weekends and hang out with Paul, his best friend from grad school. It’s not that he doesn’t have fun when he does, it’s that he spends the next week and a half recovering from it. It’s very much a once-a-semester pleasure.

He’s getting older, and as an old guy, it turns out he really likes staying home in his cozy apartment with his bad-tempered cat, watching Netflix and reading. It was a more acceptable character trait when he was still living with Jeff, but he’s working on owning being a hermit.

It’s either accepting his fate or making ill-advised public hookups a habit. Sternly, Daniel tells himself the latter doesn’t sound attractive at all.

He’s lying.

Sighing, he stretches. The second chair in Colette’s cramped, top-floor office is not that comfortable. “So. Transport.”

“Right,” Colette sighs. “I mean, we can set aside a session or two for fieldwork and drive the students around then, but nonetheless, there are two of us and twenty-five of them.”

“Also, the syllabus is jam-packed,” Daniel reminds her. He’s a little skeptical about the three classes reserved entirely for the theory of participant observation. Most of the students taking the class are interested in crossing off their social science credit while getting another class for their concentration in digital humanities, with only a handful of actual anthro majors signed up. It’s not that Daniel doesn’t respect Colette’s expertise; it’s that he’s pretty sure the ethics of anthropological research will be lost on a bunch of kids for whom sitting in a coffee shop in Tivoli, New York, population 1021, with a recording device, will form the sum total of their efforts.

“I can’t do weekends,” Colette tells him.

“I won’t do weekends,” Daniel tells her.

They stare at each other, helpless.

“I guess we have to hope a couple of them have cars and they can carpool?” he offers.

“I guess,” she agrees hesitantly. She drums her fingers on her desk for a second, staring out the door as someone walks past. Then, far too loudly, she yells, “Hey, Mario?”

Daniel cringes.

Seconds later, Mario’s head pops in through the door. “It’s-a me-a.”

“I have a question for you,” Collette says, while Daniel rubs at his mouth to hide that he’s smiling at the joke. Mario’s ego is big enough, and he’s made the joke so many times Daniel really shouldn’t still think it’s funny.

“Shoot.” Mario leans against the doorway with his arms folded. He has his shirtsleeves rolled up, and his dark hair is perfectly coiffed. If only he weren’t so straight, Daniel thinks, not for the first time. Mario is distractingly good-looking and pleasantly even-tempered and funny. Students flock to him; staff and faculty admire him. Daniel wonders if Colette is immune to it because she’s not into men; she seems to like him in a much less fawning way than everyone else.

“We’re going to need to arrange transport for our students around the Hudson Valley. Could you help us drive around with the van?”

Mario’s lips twist. Even that looks good. “Depends on when.”

“We were thinking of using a class slot, so a Tuesday or Thursday morning sometime late in the semester.”

He nods slowly. “That ought to work; my classes are in the evenings.”

Right, Daniel remembers. The bane of the film studies teacher: late classes for evening screenings. A terrible fate.

“Thanks,” Colette says. “We owe you one.”

“And I would like to cash in.” He grins. “Will you give me a lift home later?”

Colette looks to Daniel. They live in the same building and almost always carpool—for a given value of the word “carpool.” Colette’s value, as far as Daniel can tell after two years, is “Daniel drives, and Colette occasionally gives him gas money or pays for brunch.”

“Sure,” he says. “What time are you heading back?”

Mario groans. “I have an intro section till four. After that, I would like the sweet release of death, but I will take a ride home and a stiff drink.”

“I can offer the latter, but I’d prefer not to murder you.”

“Sweet.” Mario makes a dorky little fist pump. “Hey, uh, Colette?”

“Hm?” Colette hums, not looking up from the calendar app on her computer, probably trying to imagine which part of their syllabus she can squeeze another appointment into.

Rubbing the back of his neck, Mario seems hesitant. “Andrew Clayfield stopped by my office again.”

Colette makes a face. “Still about…”

Mario nods.

She sighs. “I suppose we can’t dissuade him if that’s what he really wants.”

“Is this the cannibalism guy?” Daniel asks.

“Yeah,” Mario says. “He took Colette’s class on pre-Christian practices in Christian religious ceremonies last year, and it got him really obsessed.”

“Pre-Christian is an inexact term.” Colette examines her fingernails, a clear sign she’s trying to project disinterest even though the point is probably at the heart of what she was trying to teach in that class in the first place. Sometimes, she’s just as much a nerd as the next academic. “Not all religions are pre-Christian, nor are all other spiritual practices that get mixed up in it.”

“Forgive me.” Mario’s tone is dry. “I was distracted by the student trying to sell me on the short film about a man-eating corpses.”

Daniel shudders.

“Do you think he’ll actually make the film?” Colette asks.

Mario shrugs. “In terms of talent, not really. I mean, he can make a film, but it won’t be good.”

“He’s a student; I’m not expecting a Scorsese. What about in terms of content—is it doable?”

“You want to see it,” Daniel realizes.

“It would be interesting,” Colette defends. “There’s a lot of cannibalistic imagery in Christianity, and the sin-eater is such a fascinating concept—”

“The sin-eater,” Daniel repeats. “It even sounds like a third-rate horror movie.”

“Which is what it would be.” Mario doesn’t even look at Daniel. He’s studying Colette intensely, a smile playing around his lips. “If you cochair the board for his senior project, I’ll let him do it.”

Colette snaps her fingers. “Deal.”

Daniel shakes his head. “You’re both severely messed up. And it sounds like that student needs to go to counseling.”

“Such an American.” Colette clucks her tongue. “Sometimes our darkest impulses reveal our greatest capabilities.”

“And sometimes we create terrible student films about cannibalizing corpses,” Mario finishes.

“We have a responsibility to our students,” Daniel tries. “To—”

“To support their full creative potential.” Colette’s tone is serious, even if she’s smiling a little. They’re going to spend weeks debating this; Daniel can already tell. “I fully agree.”

“I’m finished with you both.” Daniel sits forward. “I’m going to try to forget this conversation ever happened.” He levers himself up out of the creaky chair, ducking so he doesn’t hit his head on the slanted roof of Colette’s office. She gives him a lazy salute as he starts to head toward the door, but his exit is blocked by five foot nothing of Stacy Allan. She may be a full head shorter than Daniel, but she makes up for it with sheer presence. It’s not her dress style—classic suburban mom, all jeans and T-shirts with dumb slogans—or the rest of her appearance, although she has the kind of bangs that look strangely girlish and bouncy on a woman who must be well over forty. It’s her personality.

“Rhinebeck gang!” she says in an overly cheerful tone. “Did I just hear you arranging carpools?”

Colette and Daniel trade a look.

Among a slurry of other responsibilities, Stacy chairs the Digital Humanities Program as well as being dean of the English department. She will decide if their project gets continued after this year, so it’s in both their interest to suck up to her. Whether or not that’s worth spending a fifteen-minute car ride with her is yet to be decided; Colette can’t stand Stacy and might actually kill someone if she spends too long in close proximity.

“Yeah.” Daniel plasters on a smile, feeling very much like he’s arranging his own funeral. Hopefully not one at which any corpses get eaten. “You need a ride?”

“Oh, if it’s not too much trouble.” She smiles her toothy smile.

“Not at all. Gee, did no one else drive today?”

“Well, my husband needed the car,” Stacy begins, and Daniel braces himself for a long, involved story about Stacy’s husband being unable to manage simple tasks without Stacy rearranging her entire life around him—depressingly, all her stories are like that, and for a literature professor who teaches close reading, she’s alarmingly unaware of it. He thinks it’s sad; Colette thinks it’s infuriating.

“My car’s in the shop.” Mario blessedly interrupts her. “Fender bender a few days ago.”

“Oh, no!” Stacy gasps. “Are you all right? Was anyone hurt?”

“Well, funny story.” Mario walks away from Colette’s door toward Stacy’s office. “I was driving home after class, and it was pretty dark…”

Stacy follows him, hanging on his every word. Over his shoulder, Mario throws them a wink.

Thank you, Colette mouths at Mario. Daniel shakes his head, waves at both of them, and heads over to his office.

He has to set his feet sideways as he walks down the narrow staircases. He’s incredibly grateful he’s a new enough hire that he got an office over in Condelmuir, the somewhat newer brick building down the road.

Well.

Daniel says road, but he means footpath. Lobell’s campus isn’t big enough to have much car traffic, and the student body is a bit too granola to drive when you could walk or bike instead. That’s how he and Colette got into this whole mess regarding transport.

He scheduled all his classes for the morning or midday slots this semester, so he’s free until Mario’s ready to head home. That is, he has time to prepare his classes and work on his own research, but if he’s being honest with himself, that probably won’t happen today. It’s only one week until Thanksgiving, all his class preparation is done until then, and he taught two back-to-back comp lit sections this morning. His brain feels like jelly.

Maybe he should unclench and take some afternoon classes. He just hates when he only finishes teaching at four, or even worse, six. It really blocks him from doing anything else productive all day.

Fuck, he’s really going to end up like the old guy at the grocery store the other day who counted out his quarters and complained about how everyone paid in plastic these days.

Daniel’s willing to bet that guy never kissed a hot mechanic in the middle of a garage though.

Not that they actually did anything illicit, it was only kissing.

Which is a shame, because if they’d done more, it would have probably been great.

Daniel could break one of his side mirrors and go back to get it fixed.

That would, however, be insane.

He’s just going to have to keep reminding himself that he has the capacity, buried somewhere deep within himself, to do spontaneous, exciting, stupid things and to be desired by someone who wants to do them with him.

The thought is a warm ember in the pit of his stomach as he slogs through answering emails from students.

 

Dear Lily,

If you’re concerned about finishing the paper on time, let me know 24 hours before the due date to arrange an extension. It’s still a ways away, though, and you have loads of time. Try not to worry too much and keep up with the readings! If you’re having a hard time with the class, or just in general, feel free to stop by my office hours on Wednesdays from 2 to 4.

Sincerely,

Daniel Rosenbaum

 

Assistant Professor of English Language and Literature and Digital Humanities

Lobell College

30 Lobell Road

NY 12504

daniel.rosenbaum@lobell.edu

845-596-7928

 

Afterward, he rewards himself by responding to Mari Hoffman’s latest email from Santa Cruz; he hasn’t seen her since a conference last year, and she wants to know if he’ll be at an event put together by a grad school friend of theirs in a few weeks. Seeing Mari and Paul is worth the trip down to the city, and he hasn’t been since March, so Daniel tells her he’ll be there and RSVPs to the event. Then, he downloads a series of articles from JSTOR about the anthropology of sound that Colette put on the syllabus for their joint class as required reading for next week. She’s the one teaching those bits, but he likes to know what’s going on.

He makes it about halfway through the second one by the time her class lets out. It’s a lot more interesting than he thought it would be. Who knew there was so much to say about the anthropology of the senses? He did actually know that scent is the sense most strongly tied to memory from watching way too much Criminal Minds. He hasn’t thought too much about hearing specifically and how that affects perception. He has a solid idea of how to design this project or they would never have gotten the class approved. But he didn’t consider how different it would be to have only the sounds online rather than sound and visual like most streaming services and, regrettably, social media sites offer. He emails the rest of the papers to himself. Looks like his evening plans are set. He doesn’t want to let Colette down by not being ready, after all, and if they can get Stacy to approve, they can continue this project for at least another year. Working with Colette is great.

Of course, he debates with himself as he walks toward the car, he could always do the reading over the weekend and do something else tonight. It’s weirdly warm out. There is a storm forecast for later, and the air pressure niggles under Daniel’s skin. Maybe he should get out of the house more. Meeting Tony feels like a callback to an earlier time in Daniel’s life, a time before Jeff, before Lobell, before Daniel’s life was as calm and structured as it is now, and it’s made him hungry for more.

That doesn’t make it a good idea.

The drive to Rhinebeck is comfortably familiar by now, even with the darkening sky and the rainclouds drawing up. Sure, Daniel wishes there was decent public transportation, but it’s only twenty minutes at the absolute worst. Driving a full car, even with Stacy in it, reminds him of his own student days. It’s kind of nice.

He tells them about Lily’s email, funny in a very sweet sort of way. “I mean, there’s concerned and then there’s asking for an extension three weeks before the paper is even due!”

Mario hums in agreement. “She was in one of my classes last semester. Really earnest girl, very dedicated. I hope she’s all right.”

Daniel sighs. “I told her to come to my office hours if she’s struggling. I hope she does.”

“It’s so good to hear what a concerned and engaged staff we have,” Stacy muses from the back seat.

In the rearview mirror, Daniel sees Colette’s expression. Murderous would be putting it lightly. Hurriedly, he says, “Well, I’m just doing my job.”

“Still—” Stacy unbuckles her seatbelt as he pulls up in front of her house. “We should really do more to appreciate your hard work! I’ll be sure to bring it up at the next faculty council. Bye everyone; have a good evening! Hope you’re all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed tomorrow! We should really carpool more often.”

She closes the door behind her, way too gently on the first go and then barely hard enough with a little squeak.

Almost as soon as Daniel has pulled away from the curb, Colette groans. “I hope Andrew Clayfield eats her corpse.”

“Oh, come on,” Mario cajoles. “She means well.”

“You say that because she loves you,” Colette tells him.

“She loves everyone, that’s her whole thing,” Daniel points out. “It’s kind of a lot.” With Colette listening, he doesn’t want to admit he finds it comforting. He has a limited bandwidth for it, but he does appreciate it.

“She’s the faculty Title Nine rep,” Mario says thoughtfully. “If she didn’t get along with people, that would be pretty bad.”

Daniel considers for a moment to which authority figure on campus he would feel most comfortable going in case of something discriminatory happening to him, and it’s Stacy by a mile. “She is ridiculously well-suited for that job.”

“And it would be nice to get more recognition,” Mario adds.

Colette shakes her head. “I can like all her ideas and still find every word she utters incredibly grating.”

“I don’t even like all her ideas,” Daniel says. “Recognition sounds like a faculty retreat.”

“Homebody,” Colette accuses.

“Guilty,” Daniel agrees, although everyone knows the worst part of a faculty retreat is not that he has to leave his apartment; it’s the icebreakers.

He pulls into the parking lot by their building. Because the ground floor is a store for upcycled knickknacks and the owner always bikes to work, there’s plenty of space. If he’d taken the job in Albany or returned to California like his parents wanted, he would be struggling for parking and affordable rent right now. Upstate New York is quiet and cheap and charming in a quaint sort of way. If there were someone who agreed, who wanted to share that kind of life with Daniel, that would make it perfect. Until then, he’ll have to make do alone. Or maybe invent some more car troubles.

It wouldn’t be that weird to drive over the Hudson to Kingston and ask if maybe he should change his tires, hypothetically. Daniel knows he should change his tires; he just doesn’t want to deal with it. It would be expensive, but it’s an expense he’s known about and put off for a while.

He’d get to see Tony again.

Maybe.

“You want to come over and have a drink with us?” Colette asks. Somewhere in the last five minutes, she and Mario decided a Wednesday evening drink was in order.

Daniel considers, but he still has those articles to finish, and he doesn’t really like drinking during the week. It makes him sleep even worse than usual. Distantly, thunder rolls and makes up Daniel’s mind. Storms are for being cozy and at home, or for chasing a real adventure.

“Maybe later,” he says, by which they both know he means “no.” If he knows either of them at all, and he does, they’ll eventually decide it’s too boring to hang around at home, and depending on how much they have to drink, they’ll either drive to Kingston to see a movie or walk to the nearest restaurant.

“Boo, Rosenbaum.” Though Mario’s tone is serious, his eyes are twinkling. “Live a little.”

“Your loss.” Colette shrugs.

Mario waves goodbye as he and Colette peel off to her apartment on the second floor, not without reminding Daniel of their standing dinner date on Saturday. It’s his turn to cook. Colette’s a vegetarian, and she hates mushrooms, so he has his work cut out for him.

“Worf,” he calls as he opens his apartment door. “I’m home.”

There’s a noise, less of a meow than a bleat, and then the thump of a slightly overweight cat hitting the floor.

By the time Daniel’s got his shoes off, Worf has trotted over to receive his daily butt scratches.

“How’s your day been, huh, boy?” he asks, rubbing at Worf’s tailbone. He purrs like a creaky hinge. “Yeah? Good?”

Worf makes a tiny chirping noise that is the cutest thing Daniel has ever heard. He would pick Worf up and cuddle him, but Worf hates to be picked up.

“I think it’s snack time for you, mister.” Daniel sets his bag down by the couch and heads toward the kitchen. His mom sent him a bunch of candy in a decorative basket two years ago for some holiday or other, either Easter or Hanukkah, and it has since become a cat treat basket. Daniel tries not to have human treats in the house as much as possible; his self-control is nonexistent.

He selects the tuna and cheese crunchies and takes a handful, then crouches to let Worf sniff at his hand and lick at his palm until he manages to get a treat into his mouth.

“You are so spoiled,” Daniel tells him, ignoring the fact that he is the one doing the spoiling right at this very moment. “You are the most spoiled cat I have ever met.”

This is the nice thing about living alone. When Jeff lived here, he complained about how much Daniel talked to the cat, and about the cat in general. Daniel adopted Worf when he moved to the Hudson Valley, six months before Jeff arrived for a temporary adjunct position. Jeff had no right to complain about the cat; Worf was here first.

And Worf won out in the end, Daniel reminds himself, given that Jeff is gone.

He really needs to stop dwelling on Jeff. Their breakup barely qualified as a life event. Their relationship had been at least 60 percent convenience and comfort as opposed to any sort of passion. Anyway, they both knew from the start that Jeff’s position was temporary, and when he got a tenure-track position teaching pre-law at Ohio State, they were in agreement instantly that it wasn’t worth trying for long-distance or, god forbid, a spousal hire.

Daniel still gets lonely, living by himself.

Just not lonely enough to get plastered on a Wednesday or, worse yet, download Grindr and dodge being matched with his students all night.

Worf purrs loudly, crunching on his treats. Daniel tips the rest into his dish and gets up to wash his hands. It’s only four thirty, and he’s already hungry, so he’s going to have to occupy himself for the next hour and half until he can have dinner.

Or he could have a snack, brush his teeth, and head to Kingston. Maybe he’d have to tiptoe down the stairs to avoid Colette asking any questions. Maybe it would be worth it.

What are the other options anyway? Reading a bunch of anthropology papers, eating the disappointing veggie burgers in the fridge he planned for on Monday and now doesn’t really feel like, and then watching Criminal Minds until he gets too tired or it gets too scary?

He’s been progressively watching the whole show sequentially as background noise for months, but the current season has been hard to get through, largely because the actor playing Hotch left and the influx of new characters is threatening to lose his interest.

Maybe he could do something with his addiction to procedural crime dramas. An interactive map of every fictional serial killing on network television. That would be fun.

Interesting, too, actually; there’s a point in there somewhere about the sensationalizing of human misery and what patterns might be revealed about where crimes occur, fictionally, versus where they occur in reality. With his laptop fired up, he makes a note in his to-do list. He should absolutely write a grant proposal for this. Maybe after this semester, once the Hudson Valley soundscape thing takes off and needs less constant babysitting.

He would absolutely love to teach a few classes on the history of the murder mystery too.

Daniel looks outside. If he times it just right, he could make it to Kingston before the storm hits. He catches a glimpse of himself in the hallway mirror. It’ll do; his hair actually looks okay today. Criminal Minds and participant observation can wait. He’s going to Kingston.

He’s in the process of putting his shoes on without untying or retying his laces when his cell rings.

“Hello?” Daniel clenches the phone between his ear and shoulder as he grabs his keys. He didn’t even bother checking caller ID with not enough hands and eyes available to multitask that well. He hopes it’ll be a quick call.

“Hi, Danny,” his sister says brightly.

Not fast, then. Shit.

“Hey, Meredith. What’s up?”

“Not much. How about you?”

Reflexively, he shrugs. “Same old. Students, research, all that.”

“Sounds like a blast.” She sounds sarcastic.

“It is. We’re running a new project this year. Digital sound mapping of the Hudson Valley. The class is going well so far, and the dean seems pretty happy with our work.”

He doesn’t know why he does this, praising his own work. She never cares. He still has this uncomfortable urge to let her know he’s doing well, precisely because she never seems to care.

“That sounds great.” She seems earnest, but she doesn’t ask or add anything.

There’s a pause where he doesn’t want to outright ask why she’s calling, and she clearly doesn’t want to segue right from his life stuff into whatever it is.

Then, eventually, she says, “Hey, I wanted to ask you something.”

“Okay?”

“About Christmas—”

He can’t help himself; he sighs in exasperation.

“I know,” Meredith says. “But mom’s been asking me to ask you, and you know how she gets.”

“Why wouldn’t she just ask me?”

Meredith makes a noise that sounds a lot like she’s tutting at him like their mom used to. “Because you’re going to say no.”

“We’re Jewish!”

“I know, but it’s not like we were ever really practicing. We never even got mitzvahed or whatever. I’m just thinking; it would make her happy.”

“I’m coming for Thanksgiving, aren’t I?” Daniel hates flying over the holidays. It’s crowded, full of people coughing and sneezing with everything from allergies to seasonal flus, crying babies, and stress. Doing it twice in a month is way too much, especially for a holiday they shouldn’t even celebrate. Adding to which, he’s already going down to the city for one conference in December.

“That’s four days, Danny.”

Daniel sighs. “I’ll think about it, okay?”

“Thanks. Anyway, you used to love Christmas.”

He did used to love Christmas. It seemed a lot more fun than being Jewish, based on the two times Daniel went to the synagogue with his grandparents. Then he grew up and started to hate commercial bullshit and, ever so slightly in the back of his mind, to resent the lack of access to religion his parents provided.

Anyway, Daniel and Meredith both know he means he’ll put off telling her he won’t come for Christmas by an extra week or two but will inevitably do it anyway.

He wishes his parents would come visit him sometimes too. He might not be married with kids like Meredith, but he does have a life here, and it isn’t always convenient to fly out to the Bay Area. His parents are retired. He’s not.

“How are the kids?” Daniel asks, for lack of a convenient end to this conversation.

“They’re great!” She’s enthusiastic for the first time. “Well, I mean, Davy broke his arm, but that’s what you get for doing expressly forbidden backflips on the trampoline.”

Daniel forces a laugh. He hasn’t seen Davy since June. “Poor guy. I hope he gets some candy to make up for it.”

“Shh, not so loud; he’ll hear you.”

They chat a while more about Meredith’s kids, a safe topic of conversation in that they both love them. Daniel makes a mental note to send them a care package soon. As much as the conversation irks him, Daniel finds himself glad to hear her voice. It’s nice to talk to Meredith, even if it’s hard too.

When they hang up, it’s started raining.

Daniel looks down at his shoes, which are properly on by now. He looks at himself in the hallway mirror again.

There’s a fine horizontal line starting to form on his forehead. He thinks his hair looks okay today, but that’s only if you don’t look at it for too long, in which case it’s getting a bit shaggy because he’s been putting off going to the hairdresser. He has too many cowlicks to really allow for that. His eyes—well, he’s never thought they were his best feature. He has his mom’s eyes, blue and worried. He’s getting crow’s feet.

His stomach grumbles.

The auto shop Tony works at is probably about to close up anyway. And what would Daniel gain from it? He and Tony might kiss again. They might do more. Or Tony might not even be there today, or he might regret what happened last time. And either way, at the end of it, Daniel would be heading back to his empty apartment.

Instead, he heads to the kitchen and sticks his burger buns in the oven. As he sets about slicing a tomato and washing off two leaves of lettuce, Daniel tries to keep his mind on the question of whether the plastic packaging on his veggie patties negates the positive climate impact of the patties themselves.

He still can’t quite seem to forget Tony’s smile in the rearview mirror.

When the burgers are done, he sets his cutting board and frying pan in the sink and runs water in to rinse them. It pools in the sink basin, trickling down the drain very slowly. Daniel sighs. He should really call a plumber. He puts it on his mental to-do list for tomorrow.

Downstairs, he hears a door click open. There’s the low rumble of Mario’s voice, Colette’s answering laugh, footsteps down the stairs.

Daniel takes his plate and heads to the couch. Drawing a blanket over his legs he breathes in deeply and listens to the wind howling outside for a moment. Then, he presses play on Criminal Minds and rests a hand on Worf’s big, flat head.

“Guess it’s just you and me tonight, buddy.”