Behind the reception counter, the nurse shakes her head and mutters, “High like a hot-air balloon.”

“I—thank you for calling me.” She looks less pissed than she sounded on the phone, but more exhausted. The place smells like mint, potpourri, and that air hygienists blow into the mouth during cleanings.

“Sure. Get this idiot out of my waiting room, please. I gotta go home and feed my own brood of idiots.”

“Of course.” I smile reassuringly at Greg, who’s petting a strand of hair that escaped my bun. “Like I said, I don’t know his home address. Do you have it in your paperwork? Or I could bring him to my place—”

“I’ve got it.”

I turn to the door even though I’m well familiar with the voice—from the past three days of interviewing, from my worst fears, from that weird, intrusive dream I had last night. Greg’s already running to his brother, giving him the same unabashed welcome he gave me.

My first thought is a familiar one: I can’t believe they’re related. If they played siblings in an HBO Max miniseries, I’d call bullshit on the casting director. My second is, of course, Fuck.

Fucking fuck. Why is he here?

I look to the nurse. “Did you . . . did you call both of us to pick Greg up?”

“Yup. Because the first person I called was his mom, who told me she’d be here in fifteen and then canceled because of a mani appointment.” Her lifted eyebrow is 100 percent judgment. I blame her 0 percent. “I decided to hedge my bets.”

“Right,” I say. Greg yaps on about his fantabulous quinoa discovery, and I don’t want to meet Jack’s eyes. I cannot bear for him to see me, not after yesterday’s mess at Monica’s and that last look. “Understandable.” I smile weakly at the nurse. Then I turn, meticulously keeping my eyes on Greg. “Your big bro’s here to take you home, so I’m leaving. I’ll call tomorrow when you’re feeling better, and—”

“Oh, no.” Greg looks at me like I’m pouring liquid glue on a brown pelican. “You can’t leave. That’d be awful!”

“But—”

“You have to come!”

“I suggest you do what he says,” the nurse tells me. “His tooth was abscessing. They pumped him full.”

“Greg, I—”

“Come on, Elsie. I’ll pay the usual rate—”

“No. No, no, I—” Shit. Shit. I chance a look at Jack, expecting to see . . . I don’t know. A sneer of disgust. The usual smirk. A SWAT team barging from behind him to handcuff me for solicitation. But he’s waiting patiently, hands in the pockets of his jeans, the dark blue of his shirt pulling out the color in his eye. He’s not wearing a coat, because he’s physically unable to feel cold. Born without thermoreceptors—a tragedy. “Sure. I’ll come for a bit. Let’s go, Greg.” I turn to the nurse, whose interest perked up at usual rate. “Is there anything we should know?”

“Here are his meds—starting tomorrow morning. Just put him to bed to sleep the drugs off. And don’t let him make any major life decisions for the next four to six hours—no puppy adoption, no MLMs. Also, I googled it: quinoa’s a seed.”

Greg gasps. “We should get a puppy!”

Jack presses his lips together, but the dimple is right there. “My car’s this way. I’ll drive you to the humane society.”

Buckling Greg up in the back seat of Jack’s hybrid SUV takes so long, I contemplate never having kids. As the other not-under-the-influence adult, I’m probably expected to ride in the passenger seat next to Jack, but . . .

Nope.

“I’ll sit in the back in case Greg needs anything.”

Jack’s look clearly says, I know you’re avoiding me, because of course he does. He knows everything—and what he doesn’t know is his for the taking, because I’m translucent. Fun.

I realize how bad an idea this was twenty seconds into the ride: whatever they gave Greg is messing with his working memory. He’s able to focus only on what’s right in front of his eyes, and catastrophically, 70 percent of his field of view happens to be me.

The other 30 is, of course, Jack.

“You guys, this is fun. Is it not fun? Just the three of us. No Mom, no Dad, no Uncle Paul.”

“Very fun,” Jack says, navigating out of the lot.

Greg’s head lolls back against the seat. “Jacky, you can ask Elsie all those things you wanted to know. Hey, Elsie.” He attempts to whisper in my ear, though it comes out slurred and very loud. “Jacky has a thing for you. Like, he stares all the time. And he asks so many questions about you.”

“Oh, Greg.” This is mortifying. “That’s . . . really not what’s happening.”

In the front seat, Jack’s silence is quietly, painfully loud.

“Full disclosure, Jacky,” Greg continues with a loopy grin, “I made up all the answers. I dunno if she likes to travel, if she wants kids, if she’s into movies. Like, how’m I s’posed to know?”

Jack’s expression through the rearview mirror is sealed. “She has a thing for Twilight, I’ve discovered.”

Greg is delighted. “The vampire or the wolf—”

“Greg, how was the retreat?” I interrupt him with a smile.

“Sooo mandatory. But then my tooth exploded in my mouth, and I got to leave early. Hey, you know how sometimes there are shoes on the power lines? Who puts them there?”

“Um, not sure. Listen, do you remember if you got a chance to check your texts on your way to the dentist? Or your email? Or listen to your voicemails?”

He stares at me with an intense, solemn expression. I tense with anticipation as his eyes go wide. Then he says, “Oh my God. We should play I Spy!”

I sigh.

Fifteen minutes later, after Greg claims to spy a bear, P. Diddy, and a can of garbanzo beans, we park outside a pretty Roxbury house carved into two apartments.

“Where are your keys, Greg?” I ask.

“I’ve got a spare,” Jack says, finishing in twenty seconds a parallel parking job that would have taken me twenty minutes and my whole dignity. “Just make sure he doesn’t wander into traffic.”

I’d like to think that Greg’s place is what mine and Cece’s would be like if we managed to lift our credenza, could afford non-bedbugged furniture, and were less prone to frolicking in our own filth. It’s simple and cozy, covered in knickknacks that remind me of Greg’s personality and his quirky sense of humor. Jack dwarfs the entrance, but he doesn’t seem out of place. He obviously spends time here, because he knows exactly where to find the light switch, how to raise the thermostat, which shelf to set the mail on.

“Cutlet!” Greg yells, fisting Jack’s shirt. “Cutlet—where is she?”

I look around, expecting to see a cat slinking closer, but it’s just us in the apartment—me idling, Jack relentlessly inching Greg toward a bedroom. “On my desk at work. Let’s go take a nap, G. Sounds nice, right?”

“Did you water her? Has she changed? Does she still remember me?”

“I watered it. Her. She looks the same. Not sure she remembers you, since she’s nonsentient—like most cactuses. How ’bout that nap?”

“Can I have a drink first, please?”

“Elsie, could you get him some water while I put him to bed?”

“Milk! Did you know that milk comes from nipples?”

Jack and I exchange a brief Isn’t coparenting fun glance, and I rush into the kitchen. I can’t find the actual glasses, so I pour the milk into a Bonne Maman jar. I’ll bring it to Greg, then leave in an Uber the second they disappear into the bedroom. I have my lecture to prep. Cece doesn’t know where I am. I can’t be alone with Jack. Yes, perfect.

“Here you go,” I tell Greg, who’s being herded to his bedroom while humming “Gangnam Style.” “You only have almond milk—technically not from a nipple.” I hand him the jar and—big mistake. Huge. Because Greg sips none percent of it before spilling the entirety of it on Jack’s shirt.

I gasp. Greg laughs uproariously while yelling something about the milk being back on nipples. Jack gives his brother a patient, ever-suffering-dad smile. “You having fun?”