Rhonda just stared at what Dave was offering and asked, “What the heck is this?”

“It’s just … well … we’ve been together now—”

“Together?!?” scoffed Rhonda.

“Um—well…,” stammered Dave, realizing for the first time that maybe he did think of him and Rhonda as being “together.”

“Together?” repeated Rhonda.

“I just meant—”

“What are you talkin’ about, ‘together’???”

Dave talked over Rhonda, because he didn’t want to lose his mojo. “Well, we been friends now for quite a few months, and … well…” He struggled to find words to express what he wanted to say. And then gave up on trying to find words and just forced his gift into Rhonda’s arms and mumbled, “Here,” avoiding eye contact with her, because he was really nervous about what she was going to think of it.

And now Rhonda had in her possession what he had been wanting to give her.

And the strange lightness filled Dave’s insides again. And it made him all tingly. And it made him almost smile. Because he couldn’t wait for her to open what he had given her. Because he couldn’t wait to see what she was going to think of it.

Rhonda slowly looked down at the flat, medium-size, square wrapped package that had been foisted on her. And asked gently—but also in a way that let Dave know that what he was doing was not copacetic—“What are you doin’, here, bud?”

“Just open it,” said Dave, looking at the floor.

“Okay,” said Rhonda skeptically. And she suddenly wished she hadn’t let him in her house.

“Please,” pleaded Dave, letting Rhonda know that he really just wanted her to open what he had brought her. Because it would say everything that he had been unable to say over the past few months.

“All right,” grumbled Rhonda.

And she scowled at what Dave had given her.

And then started to open it.

As she did, she scoffed again. “Together. What’re you doin’, here, bud?”

“Just open it! Jeez!”

“I am!”

Rhonda opened the flat, medium-size, square wrapped package, wondering why Dave was being so weird. And why he was giving her a present. Because she and Dave were the best kind of friends—the kind that don’t have to get each other presents.

Then she balled up the brown craft paper that Dave had wrapped the present in and chucked it into the corner near the woodpile and the old newspaper pile.

And then she looked at what she had unwrapped.

It was a large, square piece of stretched canvas—with something painted on the front.

Dave felt that strange lightness grow inside him, because Rhonda was about to see what he had painted for her, and he was hoping that she was going to love it and hug him and kiss him and that they’d live happily ever after.

But that wasn’t quite what happened.

“What is this?” asked Rhonda, screwing up her face as she peered at the square piece of canvas.

Dave was a little hurt by the question. And by the expression on Rhonda’s face. “What do you mean, ‘What is this?’”