Page 77 of Shifting Gears

She does feel guilty for switching her phone off afterwards, even though it brings her peace. She’s been a bad friend lately; she’ll think of a way to make it up to them. But, for now, Dani is here.

“Hey!” Dani says once she’s closed the sliding glass door behind her, tipping Nora’s face up to kiss her upside down as she passes. “How’s your day?”

“It’s good. I just got off the phone with Kayla and Ash,” Nora says carefully. Dani sits in a deck chair, taking a swig of the iced tea Nora’s already poured. When she takes her hat off, the sun hits her hair and makes it shine. “I’ve decided to stay two more weeks.”

Dani sets the glass down slowly. Her eyes have lit up like fireworks.

“Really?” Her voice is hushed, like she can’t believe her luck. “Like, into September?”

“If you don’t mind?”

“Mind? Babe, that’s awesome!” Dani stands, abandoning her glass to sweep Nora up and into a kiss tinged with lemon and sugar.

Nora sinks into it. Quietly, the voice in her head whose volume has only been rising lately whispers.

I think I’m in love with you.

I think I’m in love with you.

Dani cups Nora’s face with gentle hands, her broad thumbs stroking across Nora’s cheeks like she’s memorizing her features again. She dips down to capture Nora’s lips more firmly.

I am in love with you.

* * *

And so Nora stays in Riverwalk as summer transitions into fall.

The weather changes gently, with the chilly September nights dusting a hint of orange onto the tips of the leaves that canopy the tree house. Dani doesn’t mention Nora’s new departure date again, but every day is a pleasure made even sweeter by the knowledge that they almost didn’t have it. Nora takes advantage of every scrap of Dani’s free time.

“I think I’m always going to have a fondness for the place where you emphatically did not ask me out,” Nora says, swinging her feet idly from the tree house platform.

Dani groans, flopping onto her back. The planks creak loudly underneath her as they always do, but Nora ignores it; over the course of the summer, they’ve been going up into the actual structure of it more and more, and now Nora pays the instability of the structure as little mind as Dani does.

“Am I ever going to live that down?” Dani asks the leafy canopy. Nora chuckles.

“Never. I’ll be telling that story when I’m sixty-five.”

Dani laughs, too, but there’s a heaviness to it that Nora almost doesn’t catch before Dani rubs her face and sits up, nudging Nora with her shoulder. “When you do, at least mention that I made you a picnic?”

“I’ll be sure to include that.”

Dani nods absently, swinging her legs back and forth. It makes an incredibly endearing picture—Dani at the edge of the platform, framed by the pink sunset, her blue ballcap on the wood planks next to her and her loose hair falling over one shoulder. She flashes a smile when she catches Nora staring. When Nora averts her own gaze back to the horizon, she can still feel Dani’s gaze on the side of her face.

“Hey, Nora?”

Dani’s voice is suddenly soft, and Nora looks over to find her fiddling with the cuffs of her faded hoodie. She’s chewing on her lower lip.

“Hmm?”

“I was thinking. Would you maybe… I mean, only if you want to,” Dani says, interrupting herself. “Feel free to say no. I know you’re leaving soon, so you might not—”

“Dani,” Nora interrupts, squeezing Dani’s hand, “you have to actually ask me a question in order for me to have an answer.”

“Right.” Dani laughs shakily, clearing her throat. Nora hasn’t seen her this nervous since their first date. “Um. Do you want to add your name to the tree?”

Such a simple question, yet with such a heavy context.

Nora’s eyes trace over the tree in question. The names stand out in bold against it, a timeless expression of friendship and support. Inscribed so deep that they’ll be there until the whole tree comes down. Dani shouldn’t want Nora to put her name there.Norashouldn’t want to put her name there, symbolizing the twisting half-truths she’s lived in all summer. It’s a deeply meaningful gesture, a show of care and investment that should have Nora running in the other direction.

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