And what I felt was that this time, I wasn’t letting him get away. Not that easily. Not without an explanation.

“Wait,” I said.

Rob paused in the hallway and looked back at me. His expression was completely unreadable. And not just because the super still hadn’t changed the burnt-out bulb above Apartment 5A.

Still, I could see his gray eyes glowing, like a cat’s.

“Let me get my keys,” I said. “We can talk while we grab something to eat somewhere.”

I ducked back into the apartment, going to the skinny hall table where we throw our keys every time we come inside. Mike was blocking it.

“Move,” I said.

“Jess,” he said in a low voice. “Do you really think—”

“Move,” I said, more loudly.

I don’t want to give you the impression that I knew what I was doing. I most definitely did not. Maybe my brother sensed this and that was why he was acting like such a total tool.

Or maybe that’s just how big brothers act when the guy who broke their little sister’s heart shows up from out of nowhere.

“It’s just,” Mike said. “You really seem, um, better than you have in a while now, and I don’t want—”

“Move,” I interrupted, “or I will hurt you badly.”

Mike moved. I scooped up my keys.

“I’ll be back in a little while,” I said, slipping out the door past Ruth, who gazed at me sympathetically through her new contact lenses. She’d given up wearing glasses at around the same time she’d given up on low-fat diets and gone high-protein instead.

“I thought we were having pizza,” Skip called after me.

I’d joined Rob in the hallway.

“Save me a slice,” I said to Skip.

Then Rob and I headed for the stairs.

Three

New York isn’t like Indiana.

Well, you probably know that.

But I mean, it’s REALLY not like Indiana. In the town where I’m from, you don’t walk anywhere. Well, unless you’re my best friend, Ruth, and you want to lose weight. Then maybe you’ll walk someplace.