I consider giving a shallow answer, but the honesty in her gaze stops me. “A fight. Like someone trying to break through something. Or out of something. I haven't decided which.”
“Maybe it’s both,” she whispers.
We stand side by side in the silence. It isn't awkward anymore. It is almost comfortable.
Her phone buzzes in her bag. She ignores it. It buzzes again and then a third time.
“You should get that,” I say.
“It’s just my friend.” She digs through her bag anyway, but her expression changes when she looks at the screen. “Hello?”
I can’t look away. Her free hand presses against the wall to stay upright.
“Yes?” she whispers. “Yes. I’m here. I accept. Thank you. I absolutely accept.”
Her voice cracks. When she hangs up, her eyes are wet. Tears slide down her cheeks before she can stop them. She wipes at them with the back of her hand, laughing even as she sobs.
“Sorry,” she manages. “I’m not usually—this isn’t?—”
My hand is in my pocket, and the handkerchief is out, offered to her before I can second-guess myself. She stares at the square of cotton as if I’ve handed her a foreign artifact.
“Here,” I say.
She reaches with shaking hands and dabs at her eyes.
“Thank you. I’ll wash it and—” She looks up at me. “Actually, I have no idea how to return this to you.”
“Keep it.”
“I can’t keep your handkerchief.”
“You can.” The words come out softer than I intended. I’m not a man who gives things away easily, but the sight of her tears has bypassed my usual defenses. “Consider it a celebration gift.”
“A used handkerchief. Very generous.”
I feel the corner of my mouth twitch. “I’m a giver.”
She laughs. It’s a mess of a sound, cracked and soaked. My hand flexes at my side, and I don’t know why.
“I got a job,” she says. “I actually got a job.”
“In this economy?” The skepticism is out before I can stop it. “Congratulations. That is not a small thing.”
“Well, a friend sent an internal referral, so?—”
“So you got an interview.” I cut her off. My voice is sharper now, the CFO in me taking over. “The referral gets you in the door. It doesn’t get you the job. Don’t give the credit away.”
She blinks at me, surprised by the intensity of my words.
“Sounds like you’re speaking from experience,” she says.
My jaw clenches. I think of my father and every success he has tried to claim as his own. “Something like that.”
She leaves it at that, and I am grateful for the restraint.
“Months,” she says, taking a shaky breath. “So many months of rejections and I was starting to think—” She stops and swallows hard. “Sorry. You don’t need my life story.”
“You’re allowed to be happy,” I say. I can’t remember the last time I said that to anyone, including myself.
