The inn has a small bar off the main lobby: quieter, dimmer, with leather chairs and a fireplace that's actually burning. Only a handful of people are scattered around, none of them from our class. We claim a corner table, and when the bartender comesover, Ivy orders white wine. I get whiskey, neat, because my nerves are shot and I need something that burns.
We sit in silence for a moment after the bartender leaves. Ivy's fidgeting with the edge of her cardigan, and I'm trying to figure out what the hell I'm doing.
This isn't the plan. The plan was to show up to the reunion, say hi to a few people, maybe work up the courage to ask Ivy if she wanted to get coffee before I left town. Something casual. Low stakes.
Instead, I'm sitting here having already confessed that I've been thinking about her for fifteen years, holding onto a book she loaned me in high school like some kind of romantic disaster.
Levi was right. I'm an idiot.
"So," Ivy says finally. "You're a doctor now."
I latch onto the change of subject. "Family medicine. I have a practice in the city."
"That's amazing. You always wanted that."
"I wanted to be a surgeon, actually. Cardiothoracic."
"What happened?"
I take a sip of whiskey, considering how to answer. "I did a rotation in family med during residency. This kid came in, eight years old, with his grandfather. The kid had been coughing for weeks, but they didn't have insurance and his parents were working three jobs between them, so they just kept hoping it would go away."
Ivy's watching me intently, and I find myself wanting to tell her everything.
"Turned out he had pneumonia. Pretty advanced. I admitted him, got him started on antibiotics, and he was fine. But I keptthinking… If they'd had a family doctor they trusted, someone they could actually afford to see, it never would have gotten that bad." I shrug. "Surgery is impressive. It's exciting, it's cutting-edge. But family medicine is where you actually build relationships. Where you see the same people year after year, watch their kids grow up, help them through the hard stuff."
"That sounds wonderful," she says, and she means it. I can tell.
"It is. Most of the time." I smile. "Though I did have a patient last week who was convinced he had a brain tumor because he'd been getting headaches. Turned out he just needed glasses."
She laughs, and there it is, that real smile I was talking about. The one that makes her whole face light up.
God, I've missed her.
"What about you?" I ask. "Levi said you're a librarian."
"At the public library downtown. Have been for almost ten years now."
"Is it everything you hoped?"
"Most days, yeah." She tucks a strand of hair behind her ear. "I get to help kids find books they love. I run a reading program for elementary schoolers every Thursday. It's not glamorous, but it matters."
"It absolutely matters." I lean forward. "Are you happy?"
The question seems to catch her off guard. "I... I don't know. I have a job I love, a house I can afford, a best friend who looks out for me. That's more than a lot of people get."
"That's not what I asked."
She's quiet for a brief moment, "I think I'm content," she says finally. "That's close enough."
It's not. It's not even in the same universe. But I don't push.
Our drinks arrive, and we fall into easier conversation. She tells me about the library, about the expansion project they're planning, about the book club she runs that's somehow devolved into primarily gossiping about romance novels. I tell her more about my practice, about the city, about my apartment that has a great view and absolutely no personality because I'm never there long enough to decorate it.
I don't tell her about the string of failed relationships. About the women I've dated who were perfectly nice and perfectly wrong. About how I kept comparing all of them to a girl I met in high school, which I'm aware makes me sound unhinged.
"Levi's really excited about the restaurant," Ivy says. "He talks about it constantly."
"He should be. He's wanted that his whole life." I grin. "Remember when we were kids and he used to make us elaborate meals out of whatever random ingredients Granddad had in the pantry?"
