Chương 2
Cold air found the damp place on my cheek.
Then I saw his jacket.
There was mascara on his lapel.
A dark wet patch covered part of his shoulder.
“Oh my God.”
He followed my gaze.
“I ruined your suit.”
“It’s a jacket.”
“It looks expensive.”
“It was.”
A laugh escaped me before I could stop it.
It came out half strangled by another sob.
“That is an objectively terrible thing to say to someone who already feels guilty.”
“You asked.”
“I absolutely did not ask how expensive it was.”
“You implied a question.”
“You seem difficult.”
“I’ve also been told that.”
This time the security man looked away to hide a smile.
An announcement crackled overhead.
My flight to Boston had begun boarding.
The ordinary fact of it felt offensive.
Planes were still leaving.
Coffee was still being sold.
A toddler nearby was screaming because someone had taken away a plastic dinosaur.
My relationship had ended, and nobody at JFK had received instructions to stop operating.
I wiped beneath my eyes with the least damaged corner of the handkerchief.
“I have to go.”
The stranger’s gaze dropped briefly to the phone in my hand.
“Are you all right to fly?”
It was such a practical question that I nearly started crying again.
“No.”
He waited.
“But I’m going to.”
Something like approval passed across his face.
I reached for my suitcase handle.
“Thank you for letting a complete stranger assault your tailoring.”
“You asked permission.”
“Barely.”
“Still counts.”
I took two steps before turning back.
He was still watching me.
“My name is Eve.”
His expression shifted again, almost imperceptibly.
“Eve.”
I waited for him to reciprocate.
Before he could, a woman in an airline uniform hurried toward us.
“Mr. Sterling, your car is ready downstairs.”
He glanced at her.
Then at me.
“Safe flight, Eve.”
I lifted the ruined handkerchief.
“Safe dry cleaning.”
That earned me an actual smile.
It transformed him enough that for one irrational second I wondered what he looked like when he laughed without trying to prevent it.
Then I turned and walked toward security.
I did not look back.
On the flight, I ordered tomato juice even though I hated tomato juice because the man beside me ordered one and my brain had apparently lost the ability to make independent decisions.
I took one sip and remembered that it tasted like refrigerated soup.
The man beside me glanced at my untouched cup.
“First time?”
“With tomato juice?”
He nodded.
“Unfortunately, no.”
He went back to his crossword.
I spent most of the flight staring at the seat in front of me and alternating between fury and bargaining.
Maybe Preston had panicked.
Maybe there was someone else.
Maybe I had missed something obvious.
Maybe three years did not disappear simply because one person had found a cowardly way to leave.
When we landed, I had eleven messages.
None were from Preston.
My sister Nora had sent six because I had made the mistake of texting her, Preston dumped me, immediately before boarding.
The last one read, If you do not call me in five minutes I am contacting Logan Airport and inventing a medical emergency.
I called before she could commit a federal inconvenience.
“He did what?”
Her voice came through so loudly I pulled the phone away.
“In a voice message.”
“I’m going to kill him.”
“Please don’t.”
“Fine, I’m going to inconvenience him severely.”
Despite everything, I smiled.
Nora had been threatening people on my behalf since a fourth-grade boy told me my ears were too big.
She was thirty-one now, a pediatric nurse with two children, a mortgage, and absolutely no increased capacity for measured retaliation.
“Did he say why?”
“Different things.”
“What things?”
“Apparently we want different futures.”
“You both wanted marriage.”
“Apparently only one of us wanted it with the other person.”
Nora went quiet.
That hurt more than if she had kept yelling.
I walked with the crowd toward baggage claim.
My reflection in a dark window looked swollen and exhausted.
“Are you coming home?” she asked.
“I have the presentation Monday.”
“Eve.”
“If I go home, I lose the account.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I’m the lead.”
“You got dumped.”
“Sterling Capital is not going to postpone a strategy presentation because my boyfriend discovered asynchronous cowardice.”
“Ex-boyfriend.”
I stopped walking.
A businessman behind me nearly hit my suitcase.
“Sorry,” I murmured, moving aside.
Nora softened.
“Sorry.”
“No, you’re right.”
The word ex felt absurdly small for the amount of life it erased.
I looked down at the white handkerchief still twisted around my fingers.
There was a tiny embroidered S in one corner.
“I hugged a stranger at JFK.”
Nora was silent for two full seconds.
“You did what?”
“I was having a breakdown.”
“So you hugged a stranger?”
“I asked first.”
“Was he normal?”
“I don’t know.”
“Did he hug you back?”
“Eventually.”
“Was he attractive?”
“Nora.”
“That was a medically relevant question.”
“He was wearing a wedding ring.”
I had not noticed the ring until the embrace ended.
A simple platinum band.
For some reason, remembering it made me feel embarrassed all over again.
“Okay,” Nora said.
“So emotionally unavailable and legally unavailable.”
“He was being kind.”
“Those are not mutually exclusive categories.”
I rolled my suitcase toward the rideshare pickup area.
“I have to go.”
“Call me tonight.”
“And Eve?”
“What?”
“Do not call Preston until he calls you.”
I watched cars crawl through the pickup lanes.
“I already called three times.”
“Of course you did.”
“I hate you.”
“No, you don’t.”
She hung up.
My hotel room in the Seaport district had one bed, one aggressively abstract painting, and a heating unit that clicked every eleven minutes.
I knew because I remained awake long enough to count.
Preston did not call that night.
He did not call Saturday either.
On Sunday afternoon, he finally sent a text.
Got most of my stuff.
May you like
Left your keys on the counter.
I stared at those eleven words until my screen dimmed.
