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Myla wipes her hands on her overalls and leans over. “You’re fine.”
“I’ve been maimed.”
“You knew the risks of the game.”
“It’s a game you came up with when you were fried off a pot cookie and Niko’s shady kombucha, not Game of fucking Thrones.”
“This is why you’re supposed to wait for the line judge to get home,” August says. “When y’all kill one another, I’m inheriting the apartment.”
Wes slumps off to the couch with a book, and Myla continues her work on dinner while Niko tends to the plants that weren’t casualties. August spreads her notes on research methods out on the living room floor and tries to catch up on what she missed in class.
“Anyway,” Myla is saying, telling Niko about work. “I told her I don’t care who her dead husband is, we don’t buy used jock straps, not even from members of the 1975 Super Bowl–winning Pittsburgh Steelers, because we sell nice things that aren’t covered in ball sweat.”
“More things are covered in ball sweat than you might imagine,” Niko says thoughtfully. “Ball sweat, actually, is all around us.”
“Okay, then, soaked in ball sweat,” Myla counters. “Brined like a Thanksgiving turkey in ball sweat. That was the situation we were dealing with.”
“Can we maybe not talk about ball sweat right before dinner?” August asks.
“Good point,” Myla concedes.
Niko looks up from a tomato plant at August, quizzical. “Hey, what’s up with you? Who hurt your feelings?”
Living with a psychic is a pain in the ass.
“It’s—ugh, it’s so stupid.”
Myla frowns. “Who do we need to frame for murder?”
“Nobody!” August says. “It’s—did you hear how the Q shut down for a few hours the other day? Well, I was on it, and there was this girl, and I thought we had, like, a moment.”
“Oh shit, really?” Myla says. She’s switched to peppers and is slicing them with a reckless enthusiasm that suggests she doesn’t care if a finger has to be reattached later. “Oh, that’s a Kate Winslet movie. Trapped in a survival scenario. Did you have to huddle naked for warmth? Are you bonded for life by trauma now?”
“It was like seventy degrees,” August says, “and no, actually, I thought we were having a moment, so I asked her out for a drink, and she turned me down, so I’m just gonna figure out a new commute and hopefully never see her again and forget this ever happened.”
“Turned you down, as in?” Myla asks.
“As in, she said no.”
“But in what way?” Niko asks.
“She said, ‘Sorry, but I can’t.’”
Myla tuts. “So, not that she’s not interested, but like… she can’t? That could mean anything.”
“Maybe she’s sober,” Niko suggests.
“Maybe she was busy,” Myla adds.
“Maybe she was on her way to dump her current girlfriend to be with you.”
“Maybe she’s, like, in some kind of complicated entanglement with an ex and she has to sort it out before she gets involved with someone.”
“Maybe she’s been cursed by a malevolent witch to never leave the subway, not even for dates with super cute girls who smell like lemons.”
“You told me that kind of thing can’t happen,” Wes says to Niko.
“Sure, no, it can’t,” Niko hedges.
