Love on the Brain by Ali Hazelwood

            “Oh, it’s not like that. We’re just—” My eyes dart to the swing. Can I talk about sex within one hundred feet of a child? Is there a law against it?

            “It must be uncomfortable, considering that Levi and I once . . .” She gives me an apologetic look. I want her to stop talking about this for many reasons, including the fact that while I have no right to be jealous, judging by the little pang in my stomach I . . . apparently am? A little bit? Yikes, me. “It’s long over,” Lily continues. “And it was just a few weeks. We met here in Houston when he came to spend the summer with Peter, before the last year of his Ph.D. Then he went back to Pittsburgh. We were supposed to try long distance, but he said he met someone else. . . .”

            The pang turns into a thud. Who did Levi meet in his fifth year? Well, me. Duh. But he can’t have broken up with someone like Lily for—

            “When he told Peter that we’d split, Peter admitted that he liked me and asked me out.” She spreads her hands, as though she cannot believe her own story. “We got married two months later, and I got pregnant right after. Can you believe it?”

            I smile. “It’s so romantic. I’m so sorry about what happened to Peter.”

            “Yeah. It was . . . It’s not easy.” She looks away. “Thank you for what you’re doing for BLINK. I know it’s high security and you can’t talk about it, but when you came on board, Levi mentioned what an asset you’d be. It means a lot, having someone like you carry out Peter’s legacy. And thank you for sharing Levi with us.”

            There’s a lump in my throat. “He’s not mine to share.”

            “I think he might be, actually. Oh, that little— Penny, you need a hat! You can’t be in the sun like that!”

            “Levi said I could!”

            Levi lifts one eyebrow, clearly having said no such thing. Penny sullenly stalks to her mother, only to stop in front of me with a shy, hesitant look.

            “Does that hurt?” she asks, shifting her weight from one foot to the other.

            “What— Oh, my nose piercing. Just a tiny bit when I first got it, many years ago.”

            She nods skeptically. “Is your name really Bee?”

            “It is.”

            “Like the bug?”

            “Yup.”

            “Why?”

            Levi and I laugh. Lily covers her eyes with a hand.

            “My mom was a poet, and she really liked a set of poems about bees.”

            Penny nods. Apparently, it makes as much sense to her as it did to Maria DeLuca-Königswasser. “Where’s your mom?”

            “Gone, now.”

            “Oh. My daddy’s gone, too.” I can feel the tension in the adults, but there’s something matter-of-fact about the way Penny talks. “What’s your favorite animal?”

            “Will you be disappointed if I don’t say bees?”

            She mulls it over. “Depends. Not if it’s a good one.”

            “Okay. Are cats good?”

            “Yes! They’re Levi’s favorite, too. He has a black kitty!”

            “That’s right,” Levi interjects. “And Bee has a kitty, too. A see-through one.”

            I glare at him.

            “My favorite animals are spiders,” Penny informs me.

            “Oh, spiders are, um”—I suppress a shudder—“cool, too. My sister’s favorite animals are blobfish. Have you ever seen one?”

            Her eyes widen, and she climbs on my lap to look at the picture I’m pulling up on my phone. God, I love children. I love this child. I look up and notice the way Levi’s staring at me with an odd light in his eyes.

            “Is your sister a child?” Penny asks after making a face at the blobfish.