EVERGLOW

XXXI. When he sees her

Small coffee shop, New York, a year and a half ago

There was never anything much to do except stare at the second hand of his watch as it ticked the time away. He doodled with his pen on the open notebook in front of him, his hand moving in time with the song playing in his earphones. His glasses slid down, and he pushed them back up, rubbing the bridge of his nose.

If he didn't always take the same private booth every day he was in town, closing himself off from the rest of the afternoon crowd, he might have seemed like an overly diligent student in grad school to the casual onlooker. He brought books from the local library he rarely opened. He brought a laptop just to look credible, but the most he did with it was check his emails when she took a while inside the shop.

He drained the cup he'd ordered about an hour ago. He had about five minutes before her art class at the kindergarten school ended, and another ten for her to walk to her favorite afternoon retreat.

If there was anything about her that worked to his advantage, it was her fondness for sticking to her schedules. Like clockwork. It used to drive him mildly crazy, with his penchant for lazy mornings and random food runs.

Now he thanked the heavens for small mercies.

She rarely missed her afternoon coffee when she read her books or sketched on her tablet. And if she did, she told Jorge, making sure somebody else knew where she was going instead.

Still sensible. Thank God.

It made it easier to find her in this huge, strange city. He'd been in and out of it for months, but he still hadn't gotten used to it. He didn't need to. When he was, all he needed to see was her. All he needed to know was where she was. All he needed to do was be where she was.

He took care to arrive ahead of her every time. Just so she wouldn't see him. Otherwise he just waited for her in his apartment.

How was he supposed to face her?

What could he say that wouldn't reek of bitterness and desperation? How was he to keep himself from begging her to come back home, to him?

How was he to survive if she refused?

And if she agreed, out of some twisted sense of obligation or, worse, pity, how was he to watch her throw away this life she loved and slowly lose herself? The way she almost did when they first lost a child.

She was doing well on her own. Doing what she always wanted to do if show business hadn't swept her away.

He glanced at his phone, at the cover of her latest book, already added to his cart. He clicked Buy, hoping it would arrive before he needed to leave in two weeks. Another story about a father, with a daughter this time.

Did she think about him? About them?

He'd never doubted she'd make it all by herself. Living in her own apartment. Making new friends. Moving on with her life.

She'd always been stronger than him.

He knew she'd never believed it. But he was nothing without her.

His empty eyes stared back at him from the dark screen of his laptop. Everything else inside him felt just as hollow. Including his life back home. It all felt like one big acting job, pretending to be okay.

As if he wasn't standing still as the rest of his world turned without him. As if the smallest reminder of her didn't tear his heart into shreds every single time. As if he wasn't stuck in a dark tunnel, constantly chasing the light at the end of it, even though it remained out of his reach. But it was the only thing that made him place one foot in front of the other now.