Chapter 2: Touch Without Judgment
The three days between Jace getting her number and the agreed-upon "hang out" were a special kind of torture. Wendy’s phone, a cheap plastic thing perpetually smudged with grease, became an object of terrifying power. It sat silent for twenty-four hours, feeding her certainty that he’d come to his senses. Then, a single vibration.
Jace: Mayor’s hair update: confirmed 100% synthetic. A source close to the barber. Thought you’d want to know.
She’d stared at it for ten minutes, her heart thudding against the inner wall of herion. Found out she also thinks microwave popcorn is a viable cooking method. We have to save her.
A burst of laughter startled her cat, Mr. Nibbles, off the lower swell of her belly. She typed back, her thick fingers clumsy on the small keyboard.
Wendy: The popcorn is a cry for help. We stage an intervention. Bring cheese.
And just like that, a rhythm began. Silly, inconsequential texts throughout the day. A photo of a bizarre garden gnome he’d seen on assignment (“It’s judging me”), a complaint about his editor’s obsession with the word “leverage,” a question about whether she preferred pulled pork or brisket (a question of philosophical depth, in her opinion). It was easy. It was normal. It was the most abnormal experience of her life.
The ease vanished the morning he was due to come over. A tsunami of panic hit at 7 AM. Her apartment, always a landscape of chaotic comfort, now looked like a crime scene against which she’d be judged. The sheer volume of stuff—the laundry mountain of stretched-out leggings and vast t-shirts, the tower of pizza boxes by the door waiting for a trip she never made to the dumpster, the crusted dishes—suddenly seemed like evidence of a moral failing.
She spent two hours in a futile, sweating frenzy, shoving debris into closets that protested with sharp groans. She wiped counters, her breath coming in short, sharp gasps from the exertion. It was like tidying the scene of a natural disaster. The underlying topography of mess remained.
By noon, the anxiety metastasized into its oldest, most reliable form: hunger. A deep, gnawing need to fill the hollow dread. She ordered. Two large meat-lovers pizzas, a family-sized order of buffalo wings, a tub of potato salad, a six-pack of cheap, creamy sodas. It arrived in a symphony of plastic bags. She ate at the kitchen counter, standing, not tasting, her mind a white noise of static. She was building a fortress, a soft, insulating wall between herself and the impending judgment.
When the doorbell rang, a sharp, intrusive sound, she was anchored at the sink, washing down the last of the potato salad with flat soda. Her stomach was a taut, overfilled drum, straining the fabric of her largest, softest hoodie. A wave of nausea, part grease, part pure fear, washed over her. She considered not answering. Let him think she’d stood him up. It would be cleaner.
The bell rang again.
She waddled to the door, each step sending a jarring ripple through her full belly. She unlocked it, pulling it open just enough to reveal the dim hallway.
Jace stood there, a battered leather satchel over his shoulder, holding a brown paper bag. He was so small, the top of his head barely reaching the middle of her chest. He smiled up at her. “Hey. I brought the intervention cheese. It’s a sharp cheddar, your counter-argument to processed popcorn.”
Her planned greeting died in her throat. She just stepped back, opening the door wider, the movement making her give a soft, involuntary groan as her stomach shifted.
He stepped in, his eyes taking a quick, polite scan of the room. They didn’t linger on the stacks of magazines or the single, overburdened armchair. They landed on the empty pizza boxes still open on the counter, the battlefield of her lunch. The two empty cardboard circles, slick with congealed grease. The wreckage of wings.
His smile didn’t falter, but it softened at the edges. “Mid-day carnage,” he observed, his tone neutral.
“Fueling up,” she said, trying for flippant and landing on defensive. “Heavy lifting. Being this glorious doesn’t happen on lettuce.”
“Obviously.” He walked over to the counter, setting his bag down next to the carnage. He didn’t wrinkle his nose. He peered into the empty tub. “Potato salad. Bold choice. Celery?”
“The devil’s vegetable. I picked around it.”
“A woman of principle.” He pulled a block of cheese, a box of crackers, and two bottles of iced tea from his bag. “I didn’t know what to bring for a… hang out. So I brought picnic rations. We can eat them… or not.”
Her guard, so fiercely up, rattled in its casing. He wasn’t ignoring the mess. He wasn’t pretending it wasn’t there. He was just… placing his cheese next to it. A quiet, bizarre act of acceptance.
“TV’s over there,” she mumbled, gesturing with a meaty arm toward the large screen dominated by a chaotic pile of blankets. “I was gonna watch some terrible reality show about people who marry their pets.”
“Perfect.” He grabbed the cheese and crackers and navigated around the furniture to the couch. It was a vast, sunken pit of worn microsuede, the only thing that could hold her. He sat on the far end, leaving an acre of cushion between them.
Wendy maneuvered herself toward it, the process a slow, careful lowering. The couch exhaled a deep, dusty sigh as she settled, her bulk sinking into its familiar embrace. The pressure on her overfull stomach intensified, a deep, aching throb. She let out another low groan, pressing a hand against the hard curve beneath her hoodie.
“Still paying those wages?” Jace asked, unwrapping the cheese.
“With interest.” She tried to get comfortable, shifting her weight. Each movement was a seismic event on the old cushions.
“The offer stands,” he said casually, not looking at her, focused on arranging crackers on a napkin. “From the storage room. If it helps.”
She stared at the back of his head, his short, neat hair. The offer was so plain, so devoid of subtext, it left her nowhere to hide. The pain was real. The shame was real. He was addressing the pain.
“Okay,” she heard herself say, the word barely a whisper.
He turned, nodded once, and slid closer across the vast couch. He didn’t sink in like she did; he perched on the edge, a small, stable figure against the landscape of her body. “Where’s it worst?”
“Lower. Like a rock.” She lifted the hem of her hoodie just enough, exposing the pale, stretched skin of her lower belly, the deep indent of her navel pulled taut.
He placed his hands on her, his palms warm and dry. He didn’t flinch at the heat coming off the strained flesh, or the impossible firmness beneath. He just started to move his hands in slow, firm circles, his knuckles digging gently into the tension.
A sharp gasp escaped her. Not from pain, but from the sheer, shocking relief. The pressure was exactly right, breaking up the clenched agony. Her eyes fluttered shut. The only sounds were the inane chatter of the TV and the soft, rhythmic sound of his hands on her skin.
“This is weird, right?” she said into the semi-darkness, her eyes still closed.
“Incredibly weird,” he agreed, his voice cheerful. “I’m rubbing a near-stranger’s stomach while a man argues with a Komodo dragon about prenuptial agreements. My therapist is gonna have a field day.”
A laugh bubbled up, weak but real. “You have a therapist?”
“Doesn’t everyone in this city? Mine’s a nice lady who thinks my career choice is a metaphor for my fear of commitment.” He shifted his grip, getting a better angle. “Yours must be rich.”
The comment hung in the air. It wasn’t a jab. It was an observation, delivered with the same tone as his comment about the potato salad. Wendy let it sit. The knots in her gut were loosening, both the physical and the metaphysical ones.
They sat in silence for a long time, just the TV and the gentle motion of his hands. The intimacy was so vast and so quiet it ceased to feel strange. It just was.
“You can stop,” she murmured eventually. “The… rock situation is downgraded to a stubborn pebble.”
He pulled his hands away, wiping them casually on his jeans. He settled back into his corner of the couch, grabbing a cracker. “Good.”
The show played on. They started mocking it. He had a dry, quick wit, picking up on editing tricks and producer-planted dialogue. She countered with an encyclopedic knowledge of contestants from previous seasons. They argued about which reptile was the better actor.
She caught herself laughing, a full, unselfconscious sound she hadn’t heard from herself in years. She wasn’t thinking about the space she took up. She wasn’t monitoring his eyes for signs of disgust or pity. She was just talking, and laughing, and existing in a room with another person who seemed to genuinely enjoy her company.
He got up to use the bathroom. When he returned, his gaze fell on the bathroom scale, half-hidden behind the door, its display dark. “A relic,” he said.
“A tombstone,” she corrected, not looking away from the TV. “For a thousand dead hopes.”
“Heavy.”
“You have no idea.”
He sat down again, this time a foot closer. “You know, my editor wants me to pitch a long-form series. Human interest stuff. About the unseen corners of the city.”
Wendy’s guard, nearly dissolved, snapped halfway back up. “Yeah?”
“I was thinking about doing one on the logistics of living in a world that’s built… smaller.” He said it carefully, watching the screen. “Not a ‘woe is me’ thing. A practical, funny look at it. The engineering behind porch steps. The hunt for XL chairs. The secret language of freight elevators.”
Her heart hammered against her ribs. “You want to write about me.”
“I want to write about a lot of things,” he said, turning to look at her. His expression was open, earnest. “But yeah. You’re the most interesting person I’ve met since I moved here. And I think people are stupid for only seeing one thing. I’d only do it if you wanted to. And you’d have full control. You could tell me to fuck off right now.”
The word “no” formed instantly on her lips. To be examined, documented, turned into a sociological study? The fear was cold and immediate.
But beneath it, another feeling stirred. A tiny, defiant spark. The most interesting person I’ve met. He saw the logistics, the physics. He didn’t see a tragedy. He saw a story of adaptation.
“I’ll think about it,” she said, the non-commitment leaving her mouth feeling dry.
“Fair.” He didn’t push. He just grabbed the remote. “I think the iguana is about to betray the hedgehog. Wanna bet on it?”
He was going to leave as the late afternoon light bled into evening,but Wendy asked him to stay, Wendy.” The apartment felt different after he was gone. The silence wasn’t just empty; it was remembering the echo of laughter. The clutter didn’t look like failure; it just looked like her life.
She stood at the counter, looking at the two empty pizza boxes beside his modest block of cheese. She picked up the cheese. It was solid, real, sharp. She put it in her fridge.
Walking back to the couch was harder. The ache was mostly gone, but her body felt present to her in a new way. Not just as a burden, but as the thing that had held the warmth of his hands, that had shaken with her laughter. She lowered herself down, the old couch greeting her like a friend.
She reached for her phone, her finger hovering over the screen. Then she typed.
Wendy: The iguana totally sold out the hedgehog. You owe me five bucks.
The reply was almost instantaneous.
Jace: I’m claiming producer manipulation. I demand a recount. Next time, we need a formal betting slate.
Next time. The words glowed on the screen. She let them sit there, not replying, just feeling their weight. She looked at the dark eye of the bathroom scale across the room. For the first time in memory, it looked like what it was: a piece of plastic and glass. Not a judge. Just a thing.
She put a hand on her stomach, where the ghost of his touch still lingered, and smiled.
She put a hand on her stomach, where the ghost of his touch still lingered, and smiled.
A week later, necessity forced her out of the apartment. Her bank, in its infinite wisdom, demanded a physical signature for a form she’d already faxed twice. The trip downtown was a gauntlet of logistics. She called a ride-share, a specialized van with a ramp that groaned its complaint as she boarded. It broke down six blocks from the central terminal, hissing steam on the shoulder of the avenue.
Wendy stood on the sidewalk, a monumental island in the river of pedestrians who parted around her with averted eyes. The bank was another twelve blocks. A hot, prickling panic began at the back of her neck. Her knees already ached. Then she saw the bus, the number 47, idling at the curb a hundred feet away. It was her only viable option. The walk was impossible.
Boarding was a slow, humiliating siege. The driver lowered the hydraulic ramp with a sigh. She mounted it, the bus tilting noticeably under her weight. The interior was a cave of stale air and muted chatter that died instantly as she entered. Every eye was a tiny, silent missile. She focused on the gray rubber floor, her breath short.
Then she saw him.
Jace was tucked into a three-seat row toward the back, his satchel beside him, typing on his phone. He had the whole bench to himself, a minor urban miracle. Her heart did a strange, painful flip. She started to turn, to find a single seat she could overflow into alone.
He looked up. His face brightened, not with shock, but with genuine recognition. He waved her over, patting the empty space beside him with a casualness that felt insane.
She lumbered closer, the bus swaying. She stopped at the end of his row. “I can’t fit there,” she said, her voice low. “I’ll crush you. There’s nowhere else, but—”
“Lay it on me, Big Mama!” he said, the joke clear in his tone. He scooped up his bag and shoved it on the floor by his feet, making a grand, sweeping gesture toward the vacant plastic bench.
A nervous laugh hiccuped out of her. There was no alternative. She turned, her back to him, and began the careful, excruciating process of sitting. The edge of the seat hit the backs of her thighs. She lowered herself, the plastic groaning a violent protest. Her wide, heavy hips met the space, but there was no space. The solid, warm mass of her pressed into his side.
He was pushed, firmly and completely, into the window. His shoulder compressed against the glass. Her hip pressed against his, her outer thigh consuming the rest of the bench. She was, effectively, sitting on a portion of his leg. The heat of him, the slight, muscular frame now bearing a fraction of her weight, was immediately, overwhelmingly intimate.
“See?” she whispered, her face burning. “I’m on you.”
“I’ve had heavier backpacks,” he grunted, but his voice was cheerful. He wriggled slightly, managing to free an arm which he then draped casually along the seatback behind her. It wasn’t quite around her, but it created a pocket of privacy. “This is cozy. Efficient use of civic resources.”
The bus lurched into motion. With every sway, she settled more firmly against him. She was hyper-aware of every point of contact: the pressure against his hip bone, the warmth along her flank. She held herself rigid, trying to minimize the load.
“You can relax,” he said softly, his mouth near her ear. “I’m not made of glass. What brings you to the thunderdome of public transit?”
“Bank nonsense,” she said, letting herself lean incrementally into the curve of his support. The tension in her spine began to unknot. “My chariot broke down. You?”
“Following a lead on the logistics piece,” he said. His voice was conversational, as if they were at a cafe and not fused together on a moving bus. “Interviewing a custom furniture maker out near the docks. Guy builds reinforced chairs for… let’s say, clients of stature.”
“You’re really doing it.”
“I am. It’s a good story.” The bus squealed to another stop. More people boarded, their gazes sticking to the spectacle of them for a fraught second before moving on. He ignored them completely. “Hey, where’s your bank?”
“Albany and Seventh.”
“Perfect. That’s three blocks from my guy. After your signature escapade, you wanna get lunch? I know a place with booths they literally bolted to the floor. I’ve seen linebackers in there. You’ll fit.”
The offer hung in the humid bus air. Lunch. In public. With him. The old fear rose, a cold tide. The stares here were bad enough. A restaurant would be a spotlight.
But his arm was a solid line behind her. The weight of her against him was a fact he had not just accepted but invited. He was warm and steady, a ballast against the swaying world.
The bus driver called out her cross-street. The doors hissed open.
“Yeah,” she said, the word leaving her in a rush. “Okay. But if I get stuck, you’re explaining it to the fire department.”
“Deal.” He gave her a slight, supportive nudge as she began the colossal effort of rising. The plastic seat released her with a sound like suction letting go. He slithered out after her, grabbing his bag. They made their way to the front, a slow procession.
On the sidewalk, the city noise rushed back in. She felt strangely light, disoriented without the pressure of his support. He fell into step beside her, a full four feet shorter, matching her slow, rolling pace without comment.
“So, the furniture guy,” she said, her breath coming a little harder as they walked. “He use reinforced steel or just a lot of hope?”
“Mostly aircraft-grade aluminum and prayers,” Jace said, grinning up at her. “His showroom is a monument to structural engineering. I think you’d appreciate it.”
They walked on, the sun beating down, the journey ahead still fraught with unseen obstacles. But for the first time in a very long time, Wendy wasn’t making it alone. The memory of the bus seat’s groan mingled with the easy sound of his voice beside her, propelling her forward one heavy, hopeful step at a time.
The memory of the bus seat’s groan mingled with the easy sound of his voice beside her, propelling her forward one heavy, hopeful step at a time. The bank’s revolving door was out of the question. Jace spotted the industrial-strength accessibility door to the side and buzzed the intercom, explaining the need for entry with a calm authority that made the lock clunk open automatically. Inside, the cool, sterile air smelled of lemon polish and quiet judgment.
Tellers glanced up from their stations. A security guard’s hand drifted toward his belt. Wendy focused on the neat line of velvet ropes leading to the manager’s office, her face a placid mask. Jace walked slightly ahead, his presence a subtle shield. The manager, a pinched man in a too-tight suit, had the forms ready on a clipboard. He extended it to her with a stiff arm, keeping his desk between them.
Signing was a production. She took the clipboard, the pen dwarfed in her thick fingers. Leaning was impossible; her stomach met the edge of the desk with a soft thud, halting her progress. She signed standing, the pen scratching loudly in the quiet room. Jace chatted with the manager about local interest rates, a distracting babble that pulled the man’s wary eyes away from her. She finished, handed the clipboard back, and turned toward the door without a word. The manager’s relieved exhale was audible.
Outside, the city sun felt like a pardon. “You handled that like a pro,” Jace said, falling back into step.
“Lots of practice being a logistical nightmare,” she mumbled, but the sting was faint. He’d seen the circus, and he was still here.
“Hungry?” he asked. “I’m starving. And I have a proposition.”
“I’m always hungry. It’s my default state.”
“There’s a new place that just opened a few blocks over. ‘Teocalli.’ All-you-can-eat Mexican buffet. Got a write-up in the Tribune for their carnitas.” He glanced up at her, his expression mischievous. “I want to try it. But I hate eating alone. Be my excuse to gorge myself?”
A buffet. A public, sprawling feast where everyone watched how many times you went back. Her gut tightened. But he’d said I want to try it. My excuse. He was asking for himself, not framing it as a favor to her.
“Is it… built for normal people?” she asked, the question loaded with a history of trapped fits and shattered chairs.
“Only one way to find out,” he said, and there was a challenge in his smile.
Teocalli was tucked between a dry cleaner and a cell phone repair shop, its front window painted with colorful glyphs. It was smaller than she’d hoped, the din of clattering plates and mariachi music spilling onto the sidewalk. Jace pulled the heavy door open and ushered her in.
The aroma hit her first—slow-cooked pork, fried tortillas, earthy beans. Her stomach growled, a primal sound. Heads turned. The hostess, a young woman with a bright smile, froze for a microsecond, her eyes flickering over Wendy’s frame, then to Jace, then to the cramped dining room packed with tables and bustling servers.
“Two?” the hostess asked, her voice brittle.
“Yes, please,” Jace said, his tone warm but firm.
The hostess bit her lip, scanning. Then her eyes landed on a cleared space near the kitchen doors, where a sturdy-looking steel block—a low platform used for storing napkin dispensers or possibly a small piece of industrial art—sat against the wall. She conferred with a busboy in rapid Spanish. He nodded, rolling the block, which was on casters, to the end of a table for four. They cleared the other chairs away.
“Is this… suitable?” the hostess asked, gesturing to the metal cube.
It was unadorned, about two feet square, and looked hellishly uncomfortable. But it was also the only thing in the room that wouldn’t collapse. Wendy felt every eye in the place. The heat of shame crawled up her neck.
“It’s perfect,” Jace announced, too loudly. “Thanks for being so accommodating.” He guided Wendy toward it. The mechanics of sitting were always a public spectacle. She turned, gripped the table edge, and lowered herself. The steel was unforgiving and cold, even through her leggings. It held. The table, a solid piece of laminate, pressed firmly into the soft shelf of her lower belly. She was wedged in, a part of the architecture now.
Jace slid into the chair opposite her, his legs not even touching the table’s underside. He leaned forward, his voice dropping into a confidential murmur just for her. “If it’s cool to save you trips, I will load up the plates and you can knock them down. Scout the terrain, you know?”
Wendy looked at the crowded buffet line, the people jostling with overflowing plates. The thought of navigating it, of feeling bodies flinch away from hers, made her feel sick. His offer wasn’t pity. It was a tactical solution. A weird, intimate kindness.
She managed a wry smile. “So you will be serving me?”
The words were a test, a poke at the bizarre dynamic. Jace didn’t flinch. He reached across the table and placed his hand lovingly on her cheek. His palm was warm, his touch startlingly gentle. “I don’t mind, babe… uh, Wendy.” He pulled his hand back, his own ears turning pink at the slip. He stood up quickly, knocking his chair back. “I’ll reconnoiter. Hold the fort.”
He weaved through the tables toward the steaming buffet stations, a man on a mission. Wendy sat, encased by steel and wood, her heart hammering. Babe. The accidental endearment echoed in the clatter of the restaurant. It felt like a seed planted in cracked earth.
She watched him. He moved with an efficient grace, assessing each chafing dish, using the big serving spoons with focus. He didn’t look back at her, didn’t seem aware of the occasional glance from other diners. He was entirely in the task. He piled two plates high—a careful architecture of crispy carne asada, dark shreds of carnitas, rice gleaming with oil, refried beans, a mound of grilled onions and peppers. He balanced them carefully, a plate in each hand, and navigated his way back through the room.
He set them down in front of her with a soft, decisive clink. The feast covered the space between them, the scent rich and overwhelming. “First recon complete,” he said, sitting back down, his eyes bright. “The green salsa is lethal. The queso is a religious experience. Dig in.”