He was such a goner. Such a dumbass for doing this to himself.

Her hand shook, just a touch, as she scrabbled the key into the lock.

“Violetta.” He stilled her with just his fingertips to her wrist. “I’m just coming up to see your apartment; you know that there is nothing wrong in there. There’s no way that...” He could be in there.

“I know.” She nodded resolutely. Her lips were white from pressing them together. But then she tossed her hair back and attempted a smile. “But what’s the point in being friends with Thor if you don’t get to watch him throw a little muscle around?”

That caught him off guard. He laughed. And then laughed harder at the expression on Matty’s face.

“Did Miss DeRosa just call you Thor?”

“You’d have to ask her.”

Seb put one hand in between Matty’s shoulder blades, a silent reminder to be good in our friend’s house. He tightened his grip on Crabby’s leash.

She swung the door open and led them inside. Sebastian immediately realized that he was holding his breath and shook his head at himself.

“Don’t worry about your shoes,” she called, though she kicked her own small heels into a basket.

Seb looked meaningfully down at Matty and they followed suit, no matter what she said. She dumped her bag onto her couch and sidled into her kitchen. “Matty, you want a snack?”

His little boy padding after Via and Crabby behaving for once, Seb took the opportunity to really look around. It was spick-and-span. Not obnoxiously so, but still, she obviously was a cleaner. Her furniture all matched, though it was as horrible as she’d warned him. Cheap particleboard crap that you couldn’t even have the satisfaction of burning due to all the chemicals. But her space was nice. Maybe a little plain, with a pop of color here and there.

He liked it. But it was...lonely.

He couldn’t exactly explain why, but the loneliness was palpable in this house, like a scent on the air or a reflection in a distant mirror.

Seb hated himself for doing it, but he looked around for evidence of the boyfriend. A baseball cap was slung crooked on her coatrack, but he recognized that as hers from softball. Beyond that, everything looked decidedly girly. Even the books on her very packed shelves were organized in a rainbow based on the color of their spines. He didn’t know any guy who would do that.

“Matty’s having pretzels and hummus. Do you want some?” She appeared in the doorway of her kitchen, one foot balancing on the top of the other.

“Sure.” He paused. “Are we overstaying our welcome? Your radar for that goes completely out of whack once you have a kid.”

“Let me rephrase. I’m inviting you to come have pretzels and hummus.”

He nodded and walked with Crabby into the kitchen. He stopped in his tracks. The living room had been lonely. But this room right here? This was downright crowded. There was a riot of color in two different fruit baskets, with plenty of vegetables thrown in as well. She’d taken the door off her pantry and every can on her shelves was again arranged by rainbow color. And she had a lot of cans. There was a lumpy, lopsided bouquet of every color on her windowsill, currently backlit by the afternoon sun. Her dishes on the drying rack were mismatched and bright, and she had a wall lined with hooks where every kitchen utensil imaginable dangled.