“Yeah,” Ginette muttered, wondering why Pete was telling her this. She looked to him, hoping for more of an explanation.

But none was forthcoming. Pete was just smiling goofily, excited about his new definition of what it means to be close to someone. To him it was a happy revelation: He and Ginette had just confessed their love for each other. And they were going to have to get to know one another in a brand-new way. He suddenly felt like the space between them was enormous, because their world had changed—they were in unknown territory and had so much to learn about each other. And he couldn’t wait to learn all about Ginette and fill that space. And get close to her again—a new kind of close.

But Ginette didn’t know that this was what Pete was thinking. Because she felt like he was saying—in a cruel, cryptic way—that he felt like he was far away from her. Or didn’t want to be close to her. Or something.

So she moved away from him. Because she didn’t want to be close to him if he didn’t want to be close to her.

Pete clocked Ginette’s move away from him. And explained brightly, “But now … you’re closer!” And this was true, according to his newly formed theory on what it means to be close.

Ginette turned to Pete. He was still smiling goofily. Which irritated her. “Pete…” she said, hurt and confused. And then said nothing more. And exhaled—a little exasperatedly.

Pete kept smiling and earnestly asked, “What?”

“Nothin’,” Ginette said, sliding farther away from the guy she had just professed her love to.

Pete responded to Ginette’s second move away from him by triumphantly repeating, “And closer!”

Ginette looked back at Pete and wanted to ask him what the heck he was saying. So she could understand what he was saying. But she was so irked by him that she didn’t want to understand what he was saying and decided that she just needed to leave.

She leaned over and grabbed her backpack, unzipped it, pulled out her flashlight, and clicked it on. And then zipped up her backpack and stood up to go—but stopped. And felt a deep sense of loss—like she had just missed out on experiencing the greatest joy she would ever know. It made her feel hollow. And heavy. Both at the same time.

But then she shook the hollow heaviness off, slung her backpack over her shoulders, and started to leave.

She didn’t really know where she was going. Wherever it was, it was going to be somewhere Pete wasn’t.

Home, probably.

When she had taken barely one step, Pete called out hopefully, “And closer!” Because, to a conventional thinker, Ginette was getting farther and farther away from him. But to an unconventional thinker, she was getting closer to him with every step away from him she took.

Ginette stopped and turned to Pete and shone her light on him.

“Right?” Pete asked, shielding his eyes from the light but still smiling and expecting Ginette to be wowed by his radical new theory on what it means to be close.