"Only one?" Jake teased, offering his hand.
"Start with one. That's how disasters and miracles begin. Sometimes they're the same appointment with different outfits."
They took the lap. Midway through, a teenage boy lost control near the cones and barrelled toward them with the wide-eyed panic of someone discovering physics in real time. Jake, still backward, saw the danger in Elena's eyes before he saw the boy. He swung them both toward the rail with a sharp pull, sat himself down hard on the wood to brake, and kept Elena upright by sheer satin and stubbornness. The teenager missed them by a foot and crashed into a cone with a sound like plastic accepting its fate. Jake's ankle sang a warning note, bright and familiar. He breathed through it the way he had learned in physical therapy rooms that smelled like rubber and determination. Elena's hands were on his shoulders, faux fur brushing his jaw.
"You okay?"
"Classic," he managed. "Slightly dented classic. Still under warranty if you believe in kindness."
"Sit," she ordered, and he did, on the carpeted edge, while Mikey hovered like a concerned orange cloud and asked if Uncle Jake needed a Band-Aid for his feelings.
Elena knelt, red velvet against her knees, and looked at Jake's face instead of his ankle first, which somehow made the ankle feel less like a solitary problem.
"Does it hurt?"