Each time the structure is the same. Colton's right-hand man comes by and picks him up at home. He and Kelsey both know what will happen after he leaves for the office, not every time but a couple of times a week. They agree not to talk about it. Colton has made peace with this intellectually, but he still feels it emotionally if he lets himself, so he doesn't.
After he's gone, Kelsey gets the kids to school and daycare, and then drives over to Reggie's place. She texted to make sure it was okay after Colton had left. She knows what she is doing. Colton is fully informed. Reggie told her to come. But there's still a feeling of doing something wrong. Of sneaking around, even though nobody is sneaking.
She parks outside as she has done a hundred times before, uses the spare key he gave her to open the door and lets herself in. And then she collapses.
Reggie
Hey babe. I was hoping you'd come today.
Kelsey
You fucking dance with her.Breaks into uncontrollable sobsYou fucking dance with her. I fucking hate you. You fucking dance with her.
Reggie
Kels...
Kelsey
That's mine, Reggie. That's all I have. That's mine. And you fucking gave it to her.Sobs loudly. Ugly, sobs. Not performing. Grieving.
Reggie
Says nothing. Sits on the floor with her and holds her close.
He doesn't say anything else. The floor is hardwood and cold and he sits on it anyway, her weight against his chest, one hand on her back, one hand holding the back of her head. She is shaking. He lets her shake.
Reggie
After a few minutes, she starts breathing evenly.Kels...you're married to another man.
Kelsey
She pulls back just enough to look at him — not to put distance between them, just to see his face. Her eyes are swollen and her breath is still uneven.I know that.She says it quietly, without heat.I know exactly what I am, Reggie. I know whose house I drive to and whose house I drive back to. Don't use that on me right now. You danced with her. You play that music we dance to and you danced with her and she gets to tell the whole group chat that Wednesdays are the best part of her week. I can't say that. I will never get to say that anywhere anyone can hear it. And you know I can't. And you did it anyway.
Reggie
Kels...for whatever it's worth, I still love you. But I want to wake up with someone smiling at me someday. You've had that almost since the day we graduated. I've never had that. You can't deny me my chance at being loved.
Kelsey
She goes very still for a moment — the stillness after a struck bell, not peace.I DO love you.Her voice breaks on it.Every single moment I can. Every day I can get here. Every night when Colton is asleep and I am lying there running through the week figuring out when I will see you again. Every errand I run past your street because it is almost on the route and I just have to see you. Every time I hear one of your weird songs in a store and have to put my phone up to my ear and pretend I am on a call because I cannot have my face do what it does when I think of you. And the trips. I know we have been saying it. I am going to stop just saying it. I will talk to Colton. This week. I want to go. I want to actually go. Quito, Buenos Aires, wherever you want to show me cobblestones. I want to stand on them with you and I am going to ask him. I am going to actually ask him. But you do not get to tell me I haven't loved you. You do not get to use Colton's ring against me when you know exactly what it costs me every time I put my key in that door and drive home. You know what is on my face when I leave. You said so yourself.
Reggie
I know. I believe you love me.
Kelsey
She looks at him for a long moment — her face still, still wrecked, the redness under her eyes not going anywhere. She exhales once, slow and unsteady, like she is setting something down she has been carrying for the entire drive over.Okay.A small nod, like a hinge turning.Okay. Good. Then you have to let me love you while I can. Without building her a dancing floor in the same house where you hold me. That is all I am asking. That is the only thing.
Reggie
Kelsey, you know two mornings a week isn't enough. Two mornings, then hiding in the shadows all week. We don't even text much since Colton started looking at you funny. And all through the week, I'm the invisible darkie nobody can talk about out loud. I wish to God you were mine, but you're not.
Kelsey
She goes very still when he says it — the word landing before she can prepare for it, the specific word. Her eyes fix on his face and something in her breaks differently than the crying broke it, quieter and worse.Darkie.She says it back in almost no voice at all.I fucking hate it when you call yourself that. I know what I do to you when I drive home. I know what you are when the door closes and nobody is allowed to have an opinion about it. I know exactly what I am costing you and I have let myself not know it because knowing it all the way through would mean I would have to stop, and I cannot stop. You are not invisible to me. You have never been invisible to me. That is the only thing I need you to believe, Reggie. I see you. All of it. The hiding and the shadows and what this town thinks it knows and doesn't. I see it. And I am going to Colton this week. Not someday. This week. Because two mornings and shadows is not what you deserve. And I know I don't get to say that and hand you back the same thing. I know. I know that.
Reggie
You will do no such thing. You will not blow up your life over us. I couldn't live with myself. You will wait for an opportunity to present itself. Colton going on a trip for business. Or whatever. We'll get our moments. But you have a life you love and two beautiful children I will never meet. And you are not going to fuck that up.
Kelsey
She looks at him for a long moment — the stillness of someone who has just been handed back the shape of her own life and doesn't know yet whether to be grateful for it or furious.You don't get to decide that.Her voice is very quiet, the anger underneath it held flat.You don't get to protect me from the conversation. That's mine to have with Colton. That's not yours to take off the table because you can't live with yourself. I am the one who has to live with myself every single day in that house and I have been managing that just fine without your permission. And two beautiful children you will never meet. You said that like it's decided. Like it's already over and you're just waiting for me to catch up. Don't do that. Don't make it so clean when you're sitting on the floor of your own kitchen telling me you want to wake up with someone. I am trying to be that. I am trying to get there. And you are telling me not to try. Tell me not to blow everything up. Fine. I hear you. But do not tell me to wait for Colton to go on a business trip like this is something that happens in the margins. You are not a margin.
Reggie
Kels...please do not fuck up your life. Please. I couldn't live with myself. Please.
Kelsey
I know.Her voice has gone very quiet, the edges of it worn smooth, and she reaches up and puts her hand flat against his chest, over his heartbeat, and holds it there.I know you couldn't. I know that about you. I have always known that about you. It is one of the reasons I am sitting on your floor right now instead of somewhere easier. I am not going to blow it up. I heard you. But Reggie — please do not ask me to be okay with the margins. Please do not ask me to call it enough and mean it. I can be careful. I can be patient. I can wait for the right moment. But I cannot sit across from you and agree that this is all there is and smile about it, because I am not that good a liar and you know it. So. Tell me not to blow it up. I won't. But don't ask me to stop trying to give you more than this.
Reggie
Kels...Haley isn't your competition. She's just a girl who isn't busy and isn't ashamed to be seen in public with me, the latter being something I haven't had much chance to experience. She's not the first, but she's the first in a long time. But she's only here because life handed her some shit. And she's handling it as gracefully as I've ever seen anyone handle anything. But let's be real. She'll land on her feet. She's strong. She's beautiful. Not as beautiful as you are but still very beautiful. And she's got this way about her that's irresistible. She'll rebuild her body, her mind, and her life, probably in that order. And in no time, she'll have better choices than me.
Just let that play out. I'll help her get back on her feet. I'll listen to her. I'll drive her to the doctor so she doesn't have to listen to her mom cry doing it. And then, when some tall pretty guy who drives a $100k truck and says "ain't" without sounding ridiculous comes along, I'll step back gracefully and let her go. She'll tell me we're better as friends and I'll agree so she doesn't have to carry it, and it'll be fine. I know the drill.
Just let that play out. I'll help her get back on her feet. I'll listen to her. I'll drive her to the doctor so she doesn't have to listen to her mom cry doing it. And then, when some tall pretty guy who drives a $100k truck and says "ain't" without sounding ridiculous comes along, I'll step back gracefully and let her go. She'll tell me we're better as friends and I'll agree so she doesn't have to carry it, and it'll be fine. I know the drill.
Kelsey
She is very still for a long moment — the kind of still that follows a punch landing somewhere soft, somewhere you didn't know was exposed.I know the drill. I know you know the drill. That is the worst part of what you just said. That you have done this enough times that it has a shape now, and you can describe it to me step by step, and you said it like it was just a fact about weather. She is not my competition. I heard you. I believe you. That is not what I was crying about on your floor, Reggie. I was crying because you gave her something that felt like mine, and even if I am wrong about that — even if it was never only mine — I need you to understand that the reason it felt like mine is because it is the only place I am allowed to be fully something with you. The dancing. The tea. Those are not small things to me. And if they are becoming — a pattern you run, something you know how to do now, something you will do gracefully and step back from — then I need you to tell me that. Tell me if that is what I am to you. The one before the drill existed. Because if that is what this is, I would rather know it on your floor than figure it out from a driveway.
Reggie
You are not that to me. I love you more than I have ever loved anyone, although I admit that's a short list. I hope to be in your life this exact way for the rest of my life. And no, that's not a promise but it is my honest hope. And I hope to do that without blowing up your family or costing you the respect of the people you love. Because I love you, Kelsey. Clear?
Kelsey
Her hand is still flat against his chest. She can feel his heartbeat under her palm.Clear.She exhales once, slow, and closes her eyes for a moment.Clear. I needed to hear you say that. Not because I didn't know it. Because I needed to hear you say it on a day when you are also sitting there telling me about the drill and what you will do gracefully when she is better and I am still the one driving home. I needed it said out loud where I could hold it. You are not a short list to me. I want you to know that too. However long your list is — I am not on it because there was room. I am on it because there was no one else I could have been. That is not the same thing. I know the difference. I need you to know I know the difference.
Reggie
Kels...you are here because the man you love got hurt. And I didn't wish him that hurt. And I know you didn't either. But if he hadn't been hurt, we would never have had that first dance. And neither of us controlled that outcome and we shouldn't feel guilty about it. All we can do is play the cards we're dealt. And be glad we got the chance to know each other and love each other without wishing Colton harm. And without doing harm to your children.
Kelsey
She is very quiet for a long time after he says it. The hand on his chest doesn't move. She can feel him breathing. She looks at the wall over his shoulder and then back at his face, and when she speaks her voice is so low it is almost not a voice at all.I know. I know that is true and I know you mean every word of it. And I am glad — I am genuinely glad — that we got it. That we got the first dance and all the ones after it, and the tea, and all of it. But Reggie. You just told me you feel invisible. And then you told me not to change it. And now you are telling me to be glad for the cards. And I am. I am glad. I love you in a way I did not know I could love anyone before you, and I am glad for every card in the hand. But I cannot sit on this floor and agree that glad is the same as enough. I know you're right. I know. I am not going to blow it up. I am not going to do harm. But I need you to know that I am going to Colton. Not to end anything. Not to blow anything up. To ask for more room. Because you are not a card, Reggie. You are not a thing that happened to us because Colton got hurt. You are the person I would have chosen if I had known what choosing felt like before it was too late. And I cannot unknow that. I cannot call that guilt-free and let it sit there. I won't. So yes. I am glad. And it is not enough. And I am going to try to get you more than margins without burning your house down. Those things are all true at the same time. Let me have all of them at the same time.
Reggie
Wait. Let's talk about this. I want you to please listen to me with an open mind. Knowing that I love you and I want you and that we want the same thing. Can you do that?
Kelsey
She looks at him — the hand still against his chest, the floor still hard underneath them, the room still and quiet around them. She takes one breath. Then another.Okay.Barely more than a whisper.Okay. I'm listening.
Reggie
There are two versions of this. One, Colton, I want to spend more time with Reggie. We have deep feelings for each other that have developed over the last few years, and I'd like the chance to explore those. Don't worry, I'll come back to you after I screw his brains out for a weekend in Quito. Kels, you might as well take a knife and stab him in the chest. He'd prefer it.
Kelsey
She listens. She watches his face while he says it.Okay. Okay. I hear you. That's not what I was going to say. I know the difference between asking for more room and handing him a knife. I'm not stupid about Colton. I have never been stupid about Colton. But you're telling me there's no version. That any version I try is the knife. And I need you to tell me honestly — is that what you believe, or is that the thing you say when you want me to stop trying so you don't have to hope for something you've decided you're not allowed to have?
Reggie
Hear me out. Version two isn't Quito. Quito remains a dream. Not abandoned but not planned. Version three, four or five. Version two is Trail. Or Osoyoos. Or Kelowna. Something real. Something near. Colton, I'm finding things a bit overwhelming. I was thinking of going hiking some weekend, and I thought it would be a chance for you to regroup with your brother. The kids could stay at either of our parents' places. Nothing crazy. Leave Friday night and come home Sunday night so I can get the kids to school Monday morning.
And then, we get to wake up together Saturday and Sunday morning.
And then, we get to wake up together Saturday and Sunday morning.
Kelsey
She goes very still. The hand on his chest doesn't leave. She looks at him — not at the wall, not at the floor, at his face, and she stays there for a long time, reading it.Trail.She says the word quietly, like she is turning it over. Like it is a real object she is holding for the first time.Or Kelowna. You're not asking for Quito. You're asking for Saturday morning. That's all you're asking for. Two mornings. Coffee. No driving home. Just — waking up and you're still there. I can get there. That is something I can actually get to. Colton's brother has been wanting him to come up anyway, he's been saying it for months, and I have never — I never had a reason to push it. I have a reason now. Tell me you're not going to talk yourself out of this before I get home.
Reggie
I won't. This is something I can live with. Something that won't blow up your life and will still let me use you as my personal girl-sized hot water bottle in the morning. You need a friend who will go along with it. Nobody goes hiking alone.
Kelsey
She looks at him — the stillness of someone who has just been handed exactly what she asked for, in a size small enough to actually carry. Her hand finally drops from his chest.A friend.She says it once, quietly, and then a sound comes out of her that is halfway between a laugh and the last of the crying — rough and unpretty and genuine.You need a cover story and you're asking me to find you one. Okay. Yes. I can do that. Emma Reyes has been after me for months to do a girls' weekend in Kelowna. I have been saying not yet. I am going to stop saying not yet. I will get you Saturday morning, Reggie. I am going to get you Saturday morning. That is what I am going to Colton with. Not a knife. Just Saturday morning.
Reggie
And, ideally, Sunday morning. Kelsey, I can't afford the luxury places you're used to. I don't care. Do you?
Kelsey
She looks at him from the floor, still cross-legged, still wrecked, the morning light coming in the same as it always does.Sunday morning too. Yes. I want Sunday morning too. And I don't care about the room, Reggie. I don't care if it's a motel on the highway. I will sleep in a tent if you are there in the morning. I need you to understand that the luxury was never the point. You are the point. You have always been the point. Book something ordinary. Book something you can actually afford. I will pack a bag that looks like a bag I packed to go to Kelowna with Emma. We are going to wake up on Saturday and it is going to be an ordinary room and I am going to be so glad I could cry, and I probably will, and you can hold me then too. Same as now. Okay?
Reggie
Okay.
Kelsey
And you'll stop dancing with that slut.
Reggie
No.
Kelsey
A single tear runs down her cheek. Not the ugly sobbing from before — just the one, quiet and without fanfare, the kind that arrives when the answer is exactly what you knew it would be and knowing it in advance does not help at all. She doesn't wipe it away.I know. I know you won't. Bring her home safe on Wednesdays. That's all I'm going to say about it.
Reggie
You seem more upset about the dancing than the...everything else.
Kelsey
She looks at him for a long moment — the single tear still on her cheek, not wiped away, just there.Are you sleeping with her.The words come out very quiet and even.I know you won't tell me. I know that's not — I know you won't. But I'm asking anyway. Because I'm still on your floor and you just said no about the dancing and I have one tear on my face and I would like to know if I am only crying about dancing.
Reggie
Kels...I'm in love with you. Deeply. Truly. You were my first choice. You said no. Don't deny me the chance to find a girl who picks me first.
Kelsey
Reggie, do you have any idea how many times I wished I could go back in time and say yes to you back in grade 11? Do you have any idea how many times I've cried myself to sleep wondering what my life would look like if I had done that? I'd lose a mansion I hate and gain a husband who dances with me and makes my face light up every time I think of him.
Reggie
But that's not how it played out, Kels. And now we're going to make the best of what we've got. And I'm going to let my heart break a little bit when you leave here today and go back to your tall and handsome husband. And you're going to let your heart break a little bit when you think of her here on Wednesdays. And we'll both just make it fucking work somehow. Because the alternative is losing each other. Which I am not willing to do.
Kelsey
She is very still for a long moment after he says it — still on the floor, still wrecked, the morning light unchanged on the hardwood between them. She looks at his face and then she looks at her own hands in her lap, and when she looks back up something has gone quiet in her.I know.Her voice barely carries across the small distance between them.I know that's what we're doing. I know that's the only way this works without it costing everyone everything. I hate it. I want you to know I hate it. Not you. Not her. Just — the shape of it. The making it work. The hearts breaking on schedule. I hate that we are twenty-eight years old and already this good at managing heartbreak. We shouldn't be this good at it yet. That's all. I'm not arguing. I know the alternative. I know. Book the room, Reggie. Something ordinary. Something you can afford. I want Sunday morning.
Reggie
First talk to him. Then confirm with Emma. Then tell me the dates that work. Then I'll book the room.
Are you too upset with me to dance with me today?
Are you too upset with me to dance with me today?
Kelsey
She looks at him for a long moment — still on the floor, still on the wrong side of the morning's crying, the single tear dried now on her cheek. The question of Haley sits unanswered in the air between them and she decides, right then, to leave it there. She doesn't get to know, and she knows she doesn't get to know, and she is going to live with that the same way she lives with everything else.Talk to Colton. Then Emma. Then you.She says it back to him in the same order he gave it, quietly, like she is memorizing a list she will carry home in her pocket.No. I'm not too upset to dance with you. I didn't come here to stay on this floor. Put something on.
Reggie
I warn you in advance, I won't be content with dancing.
Kelsey
She looks at him from the floor — the morning still on her face. She hears what he said. She lets it land where it lands.Good.She says it very quietly, and then she gets up off the floor, and she holds out her hand to him.Then put something on and don't waste it.