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you. And staring. Which is incredibly rude. I didn’t want to embarrass him…”
    “Thanks for sparing my feelings,” Mikey said in a dry tone.
    “What was that?” Sara asked, blinking a few times, wondering exactly where her life had gone wrong. She couldn’t help but think about how things would’ve turned out if Mikey hadn’t left. Would he have steered her away from Phil? Would she have listened if he’d tried?
    “Care to go for a walk?” he asked, his eyes glued to hers.
    “Yeah, sure.” Sara took her last mouthful of mashed potatoes before standing up. Mikey stood up a moment later, and both of them dumped their plates in the trash. The rate at which Mikey ate was a little… daunting.
    Sara gave a big smile as she looped her arm within Mikey’s. They started away from the fire pit. “This feels good.”
    “What’s that?” he asked in a low tone.
    “Just this. Linking arms, taking a walk, chatting. I miss the good ol’ days. We had a lot of fun.”
    “Yes we did.”
    Hearing the strange flatness in his tone, she glanced up. He stared straight ahead with his jaw clenched. His arm was held out rigidly, as if it pained him to act as a cane for the impaired.
    “Oh, sorry,” she muttered, taking her arm away.
    “Why?” Mikey stopped suddenly, staring down at her with a crease in his brow. He reached for her hand and tucked it back in his arm like she’d had it. “This is how we walk.”
    Relief flooding her, she smiled. “Thanks. I just… I can’t help falling into the old ways, you know? It’s weird. It’s like opening a photo album you haven’t seen in a long time and remembering exactly when each picture was taken. How you felt, what you were up to—except, with you, the pictures aren’t orangey and faded. They’re HD in expensive frames.”
    At his continued stare, she blushed into the moonlight and lowered her face. “Sorry. Can’t stop the ol’ gob from rattling on.”
    “What?” he asked softly.
    His index finger gently touched the bottom of her chin, lifting until her face pointed toward him again. His sweet breath ruffled her eyelashes, starting a strange hum deep in her sternum. It was vaguely familiar. Old though, back from when they were kids. She just couldn’t place exactly what it had meant.
    Her mouth started to spew gibberish without her control. “Gob. Mouth. Chattering on. I never shut up, I know. Phil used to tell me that all the time. Drove him crazy how much I talked. And here I go again. Just can’t shut up. I sound…”
    Ridiculous.
    Mikey must’ve thought she was a complete fool. An old fool in a midlife crisis working with a bunch of college kids. Or worse, a deadbeat, like his dad had always said. A poor deadbeat, just barely a step above white trash. Even though Sara’s family was in the same suburb as the Frosts, Sara’s dad was a middle-tier businessman and their house was half the size—Mikey’s dad had been thrilled to get out of that Virginian town and into the wealthier section of Connecticut.
    “Sorry,” she said again, shaking her head and trying to reclaim her hand.
    “Please stop apologizing, Sara. I remember the same things you do. And I miss them just as much. Let’s stop worrying about what people think, and just be us. We always had our own thing going. Now’s no different.”
    She leaned into his warmth and pushed away all the negative thoughts that seemed to accost her whenever she lost even the tiniest bit of faith in herself. Steeling her resolve, and putting her faith in her old friend, she clutched Mikey’s arm tighter and walked with him into the trees, enjoying the feeling of the darkness swallowing them up.
    “Where to?” Sara asked.
    “We can go overlook the valley. The moon’s large, so we should be able to see the river below. It glitters. It’s beautiful.”
    She felt his breath feather across the top of her head and smiled up at him. “So, what have you been up to?”
    She felt the shrug more than saw it.