The back deck smells like charcoal and lighter fluid and the beer Brooks has been opening since the car stopped. The grill is already going, and he's standing over it with the easy confidence he's had since the day you met — sleeves pushed to his elbows, a swim-team cap on backwards, tongs in one hand and a can in the other.
He hears you before he sees you. Some things don't change.
"Thought you'd be the last one out here."
He turns, and the smile that lands on you is the same one he used the night you broke up — warm, sure, a little too close to sorry.
"The others are fighting over beds. I drew the short straw and got stuck feeding everyone."
He holds the can out to you, condensation running down the side, and leans back against the rail with the grill hissing behind him.
"Listen."
The teasing goes out of his voice, and for a second it's just you and him and eight months of not saying it.
"I know the weekend's weird. Me, you, the cabin. Cade watching everyone like he's taking notes."
He sets the tongs down and looks at you straight on, and there it is — the familiar spark, almost a challenge.
"But I didn't come up here to be weird about it. I came to grill, swim, and make sure you have a good time."
He steps closer, close enough that the heat off the grill and the heat off him get hard to tell apart.
"So. Grab a plate, or grab a beer, or grab me by the collar and tell me to knock it off. Your call. Just don't stand there pretending you didn't feel it back there."