Truman lifted the sleeve he kept his journal in and slid it out. As usual, just feeling the heft of paper and ink made him happy.

He placed it on the counter and tried not to look as Ash flipped it open, but he couldn’t help himself. He could see the spot of Wite-Out on the y in February, the place where the ink of a new, untested pen ghosted through the paper in week two of March, and the smear where he’d erased the pencil lines in April’s border before the ink had been completely dry.

“It’s not very—” he began to say, just as Ash looked up at him.

“Holy shit. This is…amazing. This is art. You just make this up?”

Warmth fizzed in Truman’s gut. “Well, I look at a lot of other people’s work online,” he said. “And I’m in a group where we share ideas, and—”

Ash had gone back to flipping through. “But you use this. For your actual planner?”

“Yeah, that’s what it is.”

Ash seemed mesmerized. “This is amazing,” he muttered again.

“Thanks. If you’re into it, I can totally show you how to do it,” Truman offered, realizing perhaps Ash’s awe was more for bullet journaling itself rather than the particulars of Truman’s interpretation.

“Oh, no, thanks. I’m not…organized.” And Ash went back to poring over Truman’s bullet journal.

Truman took a mental photograph of Ash’s face that he could call up later, whenever he had the guts to actually start an Instagram.

“Wow, so you keep track of a lot of stuff in here, huh?” Ash had flipped to his habit trackers.

“Yes. I like habits.”

Ash looked up, listening intently.

“It’s…I dunno, I like seeing all the stuff I do. It makes me feel more like I…do things?” Truman ended awkwardly.

“It’s an accounting,” Ash said, and Truman nodded. Then he saw the tiny smile playing at the corner of Ash’s mouth and realized he was teasing him.

“Haha.”

Ash smiled. “It’s cool,” he said. “It’s like you’re having a whole conversation about your life, just with yourself.”

“God, when you say it like that, it’s the saddest thing I’ve ever heard,” Truman said.

“Why?”

“I guess because it’s by myself?”

“I said with yourself,” Ash said, and it was clear that to him, that was different.

The bell above the door tinkled for the first time since Truman had been in Thorn, and a woman in a red wool coat walked in, unwinding a thick scarf. “Hey, Ash,” she said.

“Hey, Sadie. How’s it going?”

“Pretty good. Glad it’s the weekend.”

The woman had wavy blond hair, brown eyes, painfully upright posture, and gave the distinct impression that she made herself at home anywhere she went. Her expression softened then, and she asked, “How’s your mom doing?”