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Over a year since they’d dumped her and Shira still wasn’t over it. Especially now that she had to see Danica’s stupid face in every industry trade magazine, every museum and biennale newsletter talking about the hot new thing, everybody’s enthusiastic cross-posting of her on social media.

When Shira had first perused Danica’s work, she’d told her she saw the Whitney and the Venice Biennale in her future. And now Danica had actually done it, so much sooner than they could ever have dreamed, and Shira couldn’t even congratulate her. Or say “I told you so.”

Shira loved saying “I told you so.”

“Well, good seeing you,” Leo’s dad said, snapping her back to the present. “I’m going to get this dog back inside before both of us freeze.” He hesitated, then, maybe unable to override dad instinct, said, “You should get back inside, too. You’re uninvited to the party if you get frostbite.”

Shira rolled her eyes. “Okay, okay.” And yet she turned around and went home. Leo had figured everything out; maybe she could, too.

Leo David had nothing figured out, nothing at all.

About the Hanukkah party, that is. (And other stuff, too, but he didn’t need to focus on that right now.) How had Shira pulled this off every year on her own?

“The caterers are asking if crème fraîche is okay instead of sour cream,” he read aloud from his phone, which was way too close to his face. When had he gotten so old that he couldn’t read without glasses? He slumped back into his leather couch, biting back a sigh. “Do you think that’s okay?”

Emily gave him that soft chuckle that always managed to twang some string deep in his chest. She was sitting atop one of the barstools at the counter that separated his living room area from the kitchen, eating yogurt and granola. “Christian-slash-agnostic, remember?”

“Right.” Leo’s eyes dropped back to his phone, mostly because Emily was wearing a spaghetti-strap tank top with no bra and he couldn’t afford any distractions right now. “Shira would know. I guess I could text her.”

“Then text Shira.” Emily’s voice was mild, a little curious. She’d been waiting to meet Shira ever since Leo had told her Shira had been his best friend in childhood, probably to beg her for embarrassing childhood-Leo stories.

“Okay. I will,” he said, as if he’d been waiting for permission. He tapped out, squinting, Is crème fraiche acceptable for latkes in place of sour cream?

Due diligence done, he tossed his phone aside with a sigh. Though it had been nine months since he’d moved out into his own place—not coincidentally the same amount of time since he’d met Emily; there was no way he could’ve dated while living with his dad—he still instinctively flexed his fingers as if scratching Neptune on the head. He missed that old guy.

Though he was glad his dad had the company. Leo had felt bad about moving out after the heart attack, and it was his dad who’d finally forced his hand. “I’m not some frail old man,” he’d said, though he said it while wearing reading glasses in his recliner with his graying hair sticking up all over his head, which didn’t help his case. “I want you to live your life.”

A conversation like this wouldn’t have been possible the previous year. But they’d done the work, week by week by week, forcing themselves to talk about their feelings and their hopes and their regrets, and while Leo couldn’t say he’d entirely forgiven his dad for what he’d done years earlier, he could say that he at least had some empathy for the man he’d been then and love for the man he was now.

“What if you have another heart attack?” Leo had asked.

His dad waved a hand in the air, stirring up a dust cloud. Leo should probably book someone to come by and clean the place a couple of times a month. He could afford something like that now. A little thrill ran through him at the thought. “So I’ll have another heart attack,” his dad said. “You’ll find me eventually.”

“Great,” said Leo. “That won’t be traumatizing or anything.”

“Well, I’d hope you’d find me before Neptune started eating me.” They both swiveled toward the dog, who was lying on the ground at Leo’s dad’s feet. At the sound of his name, his ears perked up and his tail started thumping.

“Neptune would never eat you,” Leo said, more out of loyalty to man’s best friend than anything else, because, truth be told, Neptune probably would. Beagles were food driven. He’d probably let a kidnapper cart Leo off, screaming while having his fingernails pulled out one by one, if he got a hamburger in exchange. “Anyway, you need me. I can’t move out.”

“You’re going to move out. That’s actually what I was doing. Looking for rentals in the paper.” Leo’s dad frowned down at his pen. “Not finding many.”

“That’s because you’re searching in 1995. Rentals are all online now.” Leo took a seat on the couch across from his dad, still focused on the dog. (He might have gotten better at talking about his feelings, but it didn’t mean he liked to look people in the eye while he did it.) “Seriously, what happens if you have another heart attack?”

His dad folded up his paper, then frowned down at it. “Don’t you remember the doctor telling us how lucky we were that we caught the first one early, because that meant they could treat the problem and hopefully avoid another one in the future?”

“Sure, but—”

“So my odds are better than they were back then,” his dad said, slightly louder. “What if I slip in the shower and hit my head? What if you do stay and live here, but I have the grand one while you’re in Italy with your mother or out on a date? Are you just never going to leave the house because something bad might happen?”

It was hard to argue with that, so Leo didn’t try. Because, honestly, he was ready to move out. Sometimes, when he thought about having his own space where he controlled the temperature and the decorations and nobody was there to judge him if he just wanted to rot on the couch in holey sweats for a day, he physically itched with how badly he wanted it. “I’m going to call you every day,” he said. “And if you don’t pick up, I’m coming to check on you.”

His dad grimaced. “You could just send a text.”

“Or I could get you one of those necklaces that really old people wear,” Leo had mused. “The ones that send an alarm if it feels you fall.”

“Yeah, I’m not wearing that.”

Leo’s phone dinged. Not from a Life Alert notification—his dad steadfastly refused to wear any form of jewelry—but from Shira’s response. He didn’t have to squint to read it, because it was in all caps. ARE YOU KIDDING? NO, CRÈME FRAICHE IS NOT AN ACCEPTABLE ALTERNATIVE TO SOUR CREAM WHEN IT COMES TO LATKES. FIRE YOUR FANCY CATERER.