Page 71 of The Art of Catching Feelings

“A little further out in the suburbs,” he said. “But yeah, not too far.”

“Do you see him a lot?”

Chris didn’t answer that right away. He was rubbing his right hand, something she’d noticed he did if they were idly watching a movie or otherwise relaxing. She’d thought maybe he did it because it was hard for him to keep his body completely still, but she remembered now what he’d texted her once, about how his hand hurt. She wondered how many different ways he hurt every day that he just didn’t tell anyone about. She reached over to take his hand in hers, pressing her thumbs into his palm.

“Is this okay?” she asked.

He leaned his head back against the couch. “Mmmm. Feels good.”

Daphne liked being able to watch him like this—his eyes closed, his lashes against his cheekbones. The sharp angle of his jaw, the exposed line of his throat. He’d taken off his shirt right after dinner, and now he was only wearing his necklace and a pair of gray sweatpants, which were somehow the sexiest item of clothing she’d ever seen.

She dragged her thumbs hard over the lifeline in his hand, and saw a tic in his jaw. “Sorry,” she said. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

He opened his eyes then, looking over at her. “You couldn’t hurt me.”

There was something in his hazel eyes, not a flicker or a spark,but something steady and true that was almost painful to look at directly. She had to drop her gaze, giving an awkward little laugh to cover the moment. “I mean, Icould,” she said. “I’m not a professional hand masseuse.”

“You’re perfect.”

She knew he probably just meant that she was doing a decent amateur job of it, but the sentiment still made her uncomfortable. “Oh, I have flaws,” she said. “Lots of them.”

“Sure,” he said. “Everyone does. What do you see as yours?”

Dishonesty? Self-sabotage?She didn’t know. “I can be incredibly stubborn,” she said. “And not always in a good you-don’t-give-up kind of way. Sometimes I just get something in my head and it’s hard to let it go, even when I know I should.”

He seemed to think about that one. “You’re self-aware about it, though,” he said. “Which means you can notice when you’re doing it and course correct. Or if someone called you on it, you wouldn’t be as defensive. I don’t think that one’s so bad. What else you got?”

“I have a tendency to idealize people,” she said. “Maybe that goes hand in hand with being stubborn. I see what I want to see, and that’s not always the healthiest way to be in a relationship.”

“You’re looking for the best in people,” Chris said. “I think that’s a generous way to be.”

She paused in her ministrations to his hand, pulling a face. “One ofyourflaws is that you’re shooting down all my flaws.”

“Well, it’s good to know you’re not idealizingme,” he said, then made an exaggerated expression of injury when she swatted his arm. “Whatever happened todo no harm?”

“I told you I’m not a professional,” she said. “I signed no oath.”

He laughed, watching her as she brought his hand back into her lap and continued her massage. “Was that what happened with your ex?” he asked. “You idealized him?”

That wasexactlywhat had happened. Their split had been inevitable, and she knew it was as much her fault as his. For however dismissive he’d been of her, however casually cruel, she’d married a person who didn’t really exist. And on some level she’d known it, and wanted whatever dream of a marriage and home and children she’d built up in her head so bad that she hadn’t allowed herself to look at the way things actually were. She’d basically told him all of that already, as Duckie.

“We married really young,” she said. “I just think we didn’t know ourselves very well.”

He was quiet for a moment. It was summer, the sun didn’t set until late. When Daphne had arrived, it had still been bright outside, but now it was well and fully night, and probably had been for some time. She realized she hadn’t even noticed the transition.

“One of my flaws is I get tunnel vision,” he said. “I used to think it was a strength, actually. I can really focus. Take every at-bat pitch by pitch, start fresh every single play. You can’t throw two balls at once, you know?”

Daphne frowned, not quite sure shedidknow. On a literal level, she understood. He seemed to register her confusion, and flexed his hand, giving hers a squeeze.

“It’s a saying,” he said. “Applies more to pitchers, really, but the idea is the same. If you throw a bad pitch, let it hang right over the plate, the guy hits it out of the park…that sucks, right? It’s the last thing you want. But you can’t throw that ball again. You can only throw the next ball, and if you try to throw both of them at once you’ll only fuck up that next pitch, too.”

“So you’re good at getting rid of the first ball,” she said. “Putting it out of your mind. That’s what you want, right?”

“I used to think so,” Chris said. “Or maybe I still do. I don’t know. I feel like my tunnel vision used to betoonarrow, that it shut everything out when I should’ve been paying more attention.And now I’ve calibrated too far the other way, and I’m trying to throw about a million balls all at once.”

They were talking about his brother, Daphne knew. But she also knew that Chris didn’t really want to get into it, was already thinking of how to edge the conversation onto another topic. It was shocking sometimes, how good she felt like she was getting at being able to read his tells, to figure out when to push and when to let something go.

“One of my flaws is sports metaphors,” he said. “Sorry. Part of the territory.”

---