Page 59 of Everything We Give

“It’s a rite of passage. I took a lot of pictures of them. I just thought you could touch upon that emotion in the article. That way Al can use the photos.”

“Maybe,” she says, popping another bite of spongy cake into her mouth.

“You don’t seem that interested.”

“Oh no, I am. It’s a good idea,” she agrees. “I just didn’t get the same impression as you. I left before the first session finished. It was hard for me to watch.”

Her grief-stricken face and tear-drenched cheeks come to mind. So does her quick exit. She was gone before my ten-minute access to the floor was up. That’s when I make the connection. She doesn’t like animals leashed, tied up, or penned. The neighbor two doors down from the house where she grew up kept his rottweiler penned in his chain-link-fenced front yard with nothing to keep him company but a plastic doghouse and the twenty-five-foot rope that kept him leashed to the yard’s solitary myrtle tree. Other than feeding his dog once a day, the owner neglected the animal. The only stimulation the dog received was watching kids bike past and neighbors walking by with their own dogs.

Reese walked by the dog every day on her way home from school, until the one afternoon he wasn’t there. She had no idea if the dog died or the owner gave him up. Animal services might have taken him away. But two weeks later, a shepherd-mix puppy appeared in the yard, and over the next couple of months, he lived the same neglected, solitary life until animal services picked him up. It didn’t matter how much love she had to give. Reese resolved to never own a pet.

Of course, she tells me this after I’d adopted the cat for her.

This makes me wonder why she was at the Rapa in the first place, so I ask her.

“Michael wanted to go. He loves horses. He grew up around them.”

“Who’s Michael? Your boyfriend?”

“Ex-husband, as of three weeks ago.” Reese pinches a crumb from her magdalena, looks at it, then absently wipes her hand on her pack.

“I’m sorry.” I don’t know what else to say.

“Don’t be. It was an amicable separation. We went to the Rapa in July as friends. It’s been on his bucket list for years. He asked me to go with him, and I did.”

I ease to a stop at an intersection and wait for several cars to pass. “If you didn’t like watching it, why’d you submit a proposal to write the article?” It doesn’t make sense to me.

“I didn’t submit anything. Jane Moreland, she’s the features editor, she called me. Do you remember Simon Dougherty?”

“The guy we worked with at ASU’s paper?” An image of a man of medium build with dark hair and black-rimmed glasses downloads. “Didn’t he grease his hair and wear a plastic pocket protector?” I grin at Reese and she shares a smile.

“That’s him.”

I’d worked as the paper’s photographer for two years and hadn’t kept in touch with any of the staff from my time there. “I remember Simon. I could always rely on him for a BIC.”

“That’s because you never carried your own pen.”

“What’s the need to when there was Simon?”

She shakes her half-eaten pastry at me. “You used to call him Clark Kent, remember that?”

“That’s right.” I lightly bounce my fist on the gearshift, softly chuckling. “He obsessed over Superman comic books and he dyed his hair.”

“He did not!”

“Did, too.” A Volkswagen passes and I shift into first, turning onto the highway. “I bought him Clairol hair dye as a gag gift for his birthday. You know what he said? ‘Thanks, dude, but it’s the wrong shade. I usedarkestbrown.’” I pitch my voice to sound like how I remembered Simon, rumbling and serious. “I’d bought himdarkbrown. As if there’s a difference.”

“I’ll be damned.” Reese looks out the front window. “I never knew.” She finishes her pastry and crumples the napkin.

“Is his hair still darkest brown?”

Her face scrunches up. “I have no idea. It’s brown. Plain old brown.”

I rest an arm on the center console and lean toward her. “So, what’s up with Clark Kent? You still keep in touch with him?”

“Yes, andSimon”—she emphasizes his name—“is a close friend.”

I look at her doubtfully. “You aren’t that close if you can’t tell he colors his hair,” I challenge.

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