“I’d say that went perfectly fine,” she said, noting my pained expression.
I sat at the table and, with a groan, laid my head in my arms.
34
“How’s your first week going?” Daniel asked.
We were walking, take-out coffees in hand, through the University of Toronto’s campus. Spring had finally arrived; the trees sprouted leafy green, and the crocuses, daffodils and tulips pushed impatiently through the garden beds flanking the stone buildings. It was after work and Jenny was going to be late getting home and so I had nowhere to be, no one waiting on me. When I got Daniel’s text asking if I wanted to join him for some fresh air, I considered ignoring it—I was still confused about how I felt toward him—but ultimately I had some questions I wanted answered. Mainly about what happened between us, and why I ended our engagement four years earlier. I was done speculating and it was time to know the truth only he could give.
“It’s going okay,” I replied, shrugging my shoulders and tucking my chin into my soft turtleneck sweater. The sun had lost some of its daytime steam and the temperature was still cool as evening approached. I was distracted by the questions swirling in my mind and nervous being with Daniel, even though there was no reason to be. Matt and I were...not together right now. My feelings on that relationship were even more confusing than the ones I had about Daniel.
My workweekhadbeen good—I remembered my colleagues, I was on top of my workload thanks to Brooke’s help and everyone seemed genuinely happy to have me back. Sure, I wasn’t as fast or efficient as I used to be, taking longer with tasks like writing memos and PR blasts I used to be able to do in my sleep.
But then I’d delivered a wrong—and time-sensitive—press release this morning to one of the senior partners, Greg Harlow. I had no clue how it happened, as I had triple-checked the file before I emailed it. But when Brooke told me Greg had called her (I was writing an urgent memo for one of the consultants and Brooke said she’d take my calls for the hour), wondering why the release was about one of our previous oil and gas clients rather than the new one we’d acquired, I’d been shocked to realize my mistake.At least it went to Greg first, Brooke had said, and I tried to hide how badly the whole mess had shaken my confidence.
I didn’tthinkit had anything to do with my memory issues, but I knew both Brooke and I were worried. “Don’t stress. I’ve got your back,” Brooke had said, a big smile on her face as she quickly found the correct release—the one I remembered writing but somehow had mixed up with the old release before hitting Send. “But maybe you should take a break for the afternoon, Lucy. It’s a lot, coming back and boarding a train already going full speed. I’m happy to cover things.”
“Thanks, but I’m good. I shouldn’t have switched to decaf this morning.” I had laughed to cover my anxiety and Brooke had kindly laughed with me, later bringing me a double shot of espresso with a smile.
“Lucy?” Daniel’s voice broke through my thoughts.
“Yeah? Sorry, what did you say?”
“What’s up?” Daniel asked, putting a hand on my arm and slowing us down. “I’ve mostly been talking to myself for the past five minutes. You okay?”
“Am I okay?” I punctuated each word, then sighed. And a moment later, inexplicably, started to laugh. Daniel watched me, the smile growing on his face mingling with confusion as he tried to catch up to what was so funny. Soon I was laughing so hard tears poured from my eyes and I had to cross my legs so I wouldn’t pee.
“Here, let’s sit.” Daniel led me over to a bench while I tried to catch my breath. “You know, you always did have the best laugh.”
“I don’t know about that,” I replied. “I snort in an incredibly unflattering way when I get going. It’s not my best feature.”
“Nah, I love it.” Daniel nudged his shoulder into mine and smiled. “It’s adorable.”
I smiled in response, then looked down at my hands, cupped around the take-out coffee cup. I felt awkward, Daniel having invoked our past while I struggled—still—to accept it wasn’t also my present.
Now or never.“Can I ask you a question?”
“Anything,” Daniel said.
“Why did we break up?” I asked, glancing his way. I wanted to watch his expression as he took in my question.
“Just going to jump right in, huh?” His face darkened briefly, but then he smiled to cover it.
I nodded but didn’t say anything else.
He sighed, turned toward me on the bench. “You don’t remember?”
I shook my head. “It’s locked away somewhere, but I have no idea if I’m ever going to remember. And I need to know, Daniel. I think...it might help with everything if I know what happened with us.”
“Okay, Lucy,” he said, nodding. “You dumped me.”
It felt so abrupt, his disclosure of the truth, that my heartbeat accelerated to the point I was certain he’d be able to hear it pounding in my chest. I wanted to blame the late-day caffeine for my jackrabbit heart rate, but I knew that had little to do with it. “What? Butwhy? All I remember is being happy.”
“Wewerehappy.”
“So what went wrong?” I asked.
His jaw clenched. “We wanted different things.”
