One More Time Read Free

parking behind the stores in the aspens. I saw a mechanic, a bank, a drug store, a craft place, a pet store, which promised the lowest prices of tropical fish around, a fishing store with live bait, and then, at the end of the row and with the most cars circled around it, a fifties era-looking diner complete with aluminum accents and neon lights.
    I parked in front of the diner, which was called Rosie’s, and headed inside. Seating was tight, but I got a space at a high bar with people sitting on stools on either side of me. Like a typical diner, the place was loud, but the food looked great—or maybe that was because I was starving. Either way I needed a bacon cheeseburger right away.
    After my food came and some of my need dissipated as I took big bites of my burger and shoved fries into my mouth, I looked around the diner and noticed a familiar face. The only person I knew in town was talking with some other cops in a booth. When he saw me looking, I waved to him, he waved back, and I returned to my burger. The food was great, with just the right amount of grease coming out of my thick burger patty and dripping down my fingers as I ate. I knew I’d be back there regularly, and not just because it looked to be the only place in town to eat out. From where I was seated, with big windows a few seats down from me, I could see a small grocery store tucked behind some of the aspens farther on through town, which was great because that meant I could get frozen pizzas to keep on hand. I wouldn’t be doing much cooking. I just wasn’t all that good at it. Thankfully I already had design jobs line up from clients back in LA who were just waiting for me to open my books and become available again. I’d be booked solid again in a month, I was sure of it, and that was a good feeling.
    I’d always loved to create beautiful things for other people, but doing so while also worrying about my relationship with Paul had been a bit of a mess. Now I could do my job and make banners and websites for people without having to worry about any complications like that.
    “Hey, Caleb.”
    I looked up to see Trent standing next to me. “Hi.” I wiped my mouth with my napkin and wanted to invite him to sit down, but the seats around me were full of people eating lunch just like I was. “On break?” I asked instead.
    He nodded. “Yeah. Glad you made it out of your house to come mingle with the townsfolk.”
    I smiled and he smiled back at me. “It’s good food.”
    “Better be. Rosie was my mom.”
    I thought he was joking at first, but he just kept looking at me, and I slowly realized he wasn’t joking at all. “Wow. Uh, congrats.”
    “Thanks.”
    “Trent, we gotta go! Break’s over, kid!” one of the guys with him called.
    Trent turned and waved to them but not before I could see him blushing, maybe at being called a kid. He couldn’t have been that far from my own age of thirty-two, but maybe since the guys with him looked to be in their fifties, that was why they referred to him with that particular appellation.
    “See you around,” I told him.
    He nodded. “Yeah. You will.”
    There was nothing ominous in the way he’d said it, just a simple, yes, I would. Probably because he was a cop and they were pretty active in the small town. He touched my shoulder as he left, nothing too major but enough for me to know he’d done it. I brushed it off, figuring it was a small town and people were probably pretty friendly.
    But after I was done with lunch and spent some time walking around the town, I was thinking about it and wondering why he’d touched me like that. It was hard for me not to wonder, but as I drove back to my new house to tackle the boxes in my living room a few hours later, it started to get easier to forget about the touch and move on.
    I found a picture of my sister and her kids and put it up on my bookcase in the living room, right next to my copy of the biography of Harvey Milk. I had romances galore, a lot