“Ya know,” Joe said. “I haven’t wanted to ask but today it seems I’ve left my filter at home.” He grinned mischievously and I laughed.
“Go ahead,” I said. “I can take it.”
“Whatever happened to the lovely Lior?”
I sighed and sat back in my chair.
“It’s a long story. I wouldn’t even know where to begin,” I said and then shook my head. “Except it’s really not. I had trust issues I hadn’t resolved, and she was trying to figure out what she wanted to do next with her life and?—”
“That didn’t include you?”
“We never even got to that conversation. And to be honest, I wasn’t being very fair to her. I hated the attention she got from her job and being so famous. It scared me. And that made her think I was trying to change her. Which, I swear I wasn’t. I just… I’ve been with people before who liked the drama. It created so many issues and put me in uncomfortable and awful situations.”
“Well Graham, I do think you have had enough drama for a lifetime.”
“I have. So it was hard to trust what she was telling me because trusting women has only brought me misery.”
“I’m sure you know this, but not all women are as self-absorbed as that last one was. My wife sure isn’t. And Lior? I could tell immediately that she was a good one. The way she looked at you…” He sighed. “Nita used to look at me like that. Now she just rolls her eyes at me.”
He chuckled and I smiled.
“Also,” I said. “She’s moved.”
“And they don’t have phones where she’s gone?”
I narrowed my eyes at him. “Maybe.”
“Bet you could find out. If you really wanted to.”
I shook my head. “I messed up.”
“You had things to figure out,” he said, waving a hand.
The front door opened and a group of women came noisily inside, shaking the snow from their hair and coats as they made their way to the counter. Joe stood and put a hand on my shoulder.
“Lior didn’t strike me as the kind of woman who wouldn’t give a second chance to someone she cares about. And Graham, that woman cares about you.”
I sighed. “I care about her too.”
“Feelings like the ones I saw between the two of you don’t just disappear, my friend. Not even when someone dies. Give her a call.”
“I don’t think it’s that simple, Joe.”
He tapped the table with his knuckle,
“But it could be,” he said, and then spun around to help his customers pick out pastries.
I took the rest of my cappuccino in a to-go cup and walked slowly home, enjoying the way the snow tamped down the noise of the city and made everything look clean and bright.
I thought about Joe’s words. About Marley’s. Even Coop had encouraged me to reach out.
And then I erased all of them and thought about the only two people that really mattered in all this.
Me and Lior.
“Screw it,” I said, startling the young man I was passing on the sidewalk.
As I climbed the stairs to my front door, I pulled out my phone and immediately tripped on something on my front porch. A rolled-up newspaper. Ever since returning from my vacation, I’d avoided the newspapers piling up and the plants desperately in need of water. It almost looked like an abandoned house. I’m sure my neighbors were pleased.
