"How is it?"
"Fine."
He raised an eyebrow.
Emily laughed. "Real fine. Slightly stiff because it's been ninety miles. Not unstable. No pain. Happy?"
"Deeply."
They sat on the guardrail.
"Do you ever miss the old version?" Emily asked.
"Of what?"
"Your life. Before me. Before all of this got complicated."
Cole thought about it.
"I miss people from it. I don't miss who I had to be to survive it."
Emily nodded.
"You?"
She looked across the desert.
"Sometimes I miss how simple invisible felt."
Cole did not interrupt.
"Nobody expected anything. Nobody could disappoint me because nobody knew enough about me to matter."
"Sounds awful."
"It was safe."
"We covered this."
"I know."
She smiled.
"Safe and alone is a terrible bargain."
"See? You listen."
Emily leaned her shoulder against his.
"Eventually."
They watched the sunset.
Tomorrow would bring work orders, customers, invoices, apprentices, veterans with envelopes they were afraid to open, and motorcycles making noises somebody needed to understand.
But today was good.
Emily let it be good.
That was still a practice.
Maybe it always would be.
Back at Thunder Ridge, the parts counter remained exactly where it had always been.
Emily refused to remove it.
New employees sometimes asked why the head mechanic's name was painted over the central bench while an old gray counter sat thirty feet away covered in scratches and faded inventory labels.
Marcus usually answered before she could.
"Because that is where we learned the difference between seeing somebody and looking at them."
The mounted timing chain hung nearby.
The sign beneath it eventually gained a third line.
FIRST ASSUMPTION FAILED.
LISTEN BEFORE YOU DECIDE.
ASK THE PERSON YOU ARE IGNORING.
Cody claimed the final line was too long.