“That’s fine for now. But, again, if I decide I want kids, it won’t work.”
Sebastian pedaled in silence for a moment. “What about doing something with cycling and girls?” he asked. “Like, a program just for girls. You could teach them to ride if they didn’t know how, and lead rides, and take them on trips.”
“I’d have to see what kind of programs are out there. Make sure there’s not something like this already.” It was a good idea. But the thought of building something from the ground up, figuring out what kind of permits and insurance she’d need, and if she’d have to work with a bike shop or an existing organization, and where she’d find other adults to help, and how she’d recruit the riders all left her feeling overwhelmed, crushed, and exhausted before she’d even begun.
“But you’d be great!” he said when Abby told him that. “And it could work. You could stay in one place, in Philly, or wherever.” Abby wondered if wherever meant Brooklyn, but didn’t ask. “It’d be everything you love. Biking, and…” He waved his hand. “Girl stuff. All of the feminist whatever.”
Abby raised her eyebrows. “?‘The feminist whatever’?”
“You could lead trips when it’s warm enough and have classes when it’s not. You could ask bike shops to volunteer or donate stuff.”
“I could.” Abby’s mind was turning as she wondered how it would work and whom she could ask. “Maybe. Maybe there’s a niche.” After a minute, she said, “Thank you.”
“I didn’t do anything.”
“You took me seriously,” Abby said. “That’s important.”
“Any time,” Sebastian had said.
Abby leaned over her handlebars.
“How about you?” she asked. She made her voice mock-serious and asked, “Where do you see yourself in ten years?”
“I don’t know. I like my job. But I think I’d like… I don’t know. Kids. A house. A family. Not this minute, but maybe someday,” he said as Lincoln put on a burst of speed to join them.
“I think you’d be a good father,” Abby was saying.
Abby was 90 percent positive that she’d heard Lincoln cough the word bullshit under his breath. Sebastian, meanwhile, was looking flattered. “Oh, yeah?”
“Absolutely,” she said. “You can teach your kids all about being prepared, and asking for help when they need it.”
“Hey, I got that flat changed. Eventually.”
“Mister I-don’t-need-your-tire-irons.”
“I wasn’t that bad!” Sebastian protested.
“You were,” said Ted, coasting past.
“Sorry, but it’s true,” said Sue, trailing behind Ted.
“Oh, and you can also model good behavior about listening to your leaders, and following directions and staying safe,” said Abby.
Sebastian smoothed out his vest. He’d kept his promise and had put it on for the past two mornings, without complaint. Without too much complaint, at least. The things we do for love, he’d said, as he’d pulled it on that morning. But he’d only been teasing. Of course.
“If I start a group, maybe I’ll invite you to come and teach kids how to handle it if they almost crash into a truck. We’ll call it Seething Hotly 101.”
“Seething hotly?” Sebastian repeated.
“Oh, come on. Don’t tell me you don’t know that’s what you were doing.” She switched into a lower gear as the path rose in a gentle hill, and felt her spine stiffen as she spotted Eileen, who’d been riding with Carol Landon.
“Hello, ladies!” Abby called, her voice hearty and cheerful-sounding. “Everything okay?”
“Lovely,” said Eileen with a tight-lipped smile. Abby’s skin prickled, and she felt a drop of sweat slide from the back of her neck to the small of her back. Did her mother know what was going on with Sebastian? Had she seen something? Figured it out somehow?
She heard Sebastian and Lincoln coming up behind her. “Hello, Mrs. Fenske!” Sebastian called.
“Eileen,” said her mother with that same taut smile. “Please.”
Abby moved her hands from the brake hoods to the handlebar drops, a position that left her hunched over the top of her bike with her gaze toward the ground. The trail, which had been cinders and dirt, was paved now, winding along the canal, through a park. On a gentle grassy slope, a father was helping a little kid fly a kite. A woman walked a fancy-looking dog with pink ribbons braided in its ear fur and a put-upon expression on its face. Buffalo was approaching. Instead of the long expanses of emptiness, they were riding through an actual neighborhood now, and she could hear the sounds of traffic nearby. Buffalo, then Niagara Falls. The end of the trip. The end of whatever this was with Sebastian.
Abby clicked into a higher gear and picked up her pace. “I’m going to check in with Lily and Morgan,” she said to Sebastian. “I’ll see you both at lunch.” She pedaled hard, legs pumping, lungs burning, getting away from her mother, wishing she could escape her thoughts, her guilt, as easily.
Sebastian
Tell me everything,” said Lincoln as soon as they’d passed Eileen and Carol Landon. Lincoln had, of course, noticed Sebastian’s absence from their hotel rooms for the past three nights, but, so far, had kept quiet.
“I’m not telling you everything,” Sebastian said.
“Tell me something, then,” Lincoln wheedled. When Sebastian didn’t, Lincoln said, “I’m suspecting the whole be-her-friend experiment is over?”
He sounded a little snippy. Sebastian nodded, then said, “It isn’t what you think.”
“I guess not, if you actually spent three nights in a row with her.”
Sebastian didn’t answer. “Tell me what’s going on,” Lincoln said. “Come on. Give me something. I’m married. I’m never going to kiss a woman again for the first time. I have to live vicariously.”
“There is nothing to tell,” said Sebastian, feeling suddenly chivalrous.
“Oh, there’s plenty to tell,” said Lincoln. “Do you like her?”
“I do.”
“Are you planning on seeing her again?”
And there was the crux of it. Sebastian did want to see Abby again. But if Abby wanted babies soon, if she was looking for another man to slot into the serious boyfriend/possible husband position for the wedding he bet her mother had already started to plan, Sebastian didn’t think that was him. At least, not yet. “She lives in Philadelphia,” he said.
“There’s this marvelous new invention called the train,” said Lincoln. “Perhaps you’ve heard of it?”
“We haven’t made any plans yet.”
Lincoln wasn’t letting it go. “What do you want?”
Sebastian didn’t answer. He didn’t know if he wanted to be her boyfriend. He didn’t know if he wanted to be her husband, or anyone’s husband; the father of her children, or of any children at all. But he absolutely wanted to see Abby Stern, on bikes and in bed and all the places in between. “I want to see her when the trip is over.”
“So?” asked Lincoln. “What am I missing? What’s the issue?”
The handlebar tape was coming unraveled from the right side of the handlebar. Sebastian rewrapped the loose end as best he could, one-handed.
“You need to figure it out,” Lincoln told him.
“I will.”
“Because this is the last day of riding…”
“I know.”
“… and tomorrow we’re going to Niagara Falls…”
“I am aware.”
“… and the day after that we’re going back to New York City.”
“Yes. Got it. I have the same itinerary that you do.”
“So if you’re going to say something, you better say it soon,” Lincoln concluded.