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He gathered his tools with the systematic efficiency of someone who needed his hands occupied. He was almost to the door when she said:

“Shane.”

He stopped.

“Thank you,” she said. “For the window.”

He nodded, to the door rather than at her.

“And...” She paused, and he heard in the pause everything she wasn’t saying, the whole accumulated weight of four months of almost and not yet and the quality of a room they kept ending up in together. “Just. Thank you.”

He stood at the door for one second longer than he needed to.

He left.

* * *

He walked back to the hardware store with his tools and the look of a man who had said one word and could not stop turning it over.

Allison.

He’d said it. Not in firelight, not with intention, not as a choice, just said it, the way you said the name of someone who had been living in your thoughts long enough that the name came naturally, without the guard you’d been keeping on it.

He unlocked the hardware store and turned the lights on and stood in the quiet of the place for a moment, the familiar smell of it, metal and wood and the warmth of a building that had been there long enough to have its own temperature, and thought about what it meant that he’d said her name like that and couldn’t find a version of the answer that didn’t mean the same thing.

Doug arrived at five past eight.

He looked at Shane behind the counter.

He looked at Shane’s expression.

He went to make coffee without saying anything, which was its own kind of saying something.

* * *

It was Rick Brennan who mentioned the trail hike, at eleven fifteen, when he came in for weatherstripping and spent fourteen minutes talking about things other than weatherstripping, which was standard for Rick.

“Jake Morrison’s taking a group up the ridge Saturday,” Rick said, examining a display of door sweeps with the thoroughness of a man who was not going to buy a door sweep. “Got some of the teachers together. Clear weather coming.”

Shane wrote something on the order form.

“Good trail,” he said.

“Beautiful up there in December, apparently. Snow on the peaks.” Rick picked up a door sweep and put it back. “Allison’s going.”

The pen stopped.

Shane looked at what he’d written.

He’d written exterior caulk again. He had exterior caulk. He’d ordered exterior caulk three weeks ago. He crossed it out.

“First time up the ridge for her,” Rick continued. “Jake’s been talking it up all week apparently.” He finally picked up the weatherstripping he’d come in for. “You should come.”

“Busy Saturday.”

“You’re always busy Saturday.”

“Things need doing on Saturdays.”