I suspected she would ask this right off the bat.
I say, “My phone’s dead, so I borrowed one off this woman on the train.”
“Is everything okay?”
“How’s your morning going?” I ask.
“Fine. I just saw you, silly.”
“I know.”
She spins around on the swivel chair at her desk, says, “So you just wanted to talk to me so badly that you borrowed a stranger’s phone?”
“I did, actually.”
“You’re sweet.”
I just sit there, absorbing her voice.
“Daniela?”
“Yes?”
“I really miss you.”
“What’s wrong, Jason?”
“Nothing.”
“You sound weird. Talk to me.”
“I was walking to the El, and it just hit me.”
“What did?”
“I take so many moments with you for granted. I walk out the door to work, and I’m already thinking about my day, about the lecture I have to give, whatever, and I just…I had a moment of clarity getting on the train about how much I love you. How much you mean to me. Because you never know.”
“Never know what?”
“When it could all be taken away. Anyway, I tried to call you, but my phone was dead.”
For a long moment, there’s just silence on the other end of the line.
“Daniela?”
“I’m here. And I feel the same way about you. You know that, right?”
I close my eyes against the emotion.
Thinking, I could cross the street right now and come inside and tell you everything.
I am so lost, my love.
Daniela steps down off her chair and walks over to the window. She’s wearing a long, cream-colored sweater over yoga pants. Her hair is up, and she’s holding a mug of what I suspect is tea from a local shop.
She cradles her belly, which is rounded with child.
Charlie is going to be a big brother.
I smile through the tears, wondering what he thinks of that.
It’s something my Charlie missed.
“Jason, are you sure everything’s okay?”
“Positive.”
“Well, look, I’m on a deadline for this client, so…”
“You have to go.”
“I do.”
I don’t want her to. I need to keep hearing her voice.
“Jason?”
“Yes?”
“I love you very much.”
“I love you too. You have no idea.”
“I’ll see you tonight.”
No, you’ll see a very lucky version of me who has no clue how good he has it.
She hangs up.
Goes back to her desk.
I return the phone to my pocket, shivering, my thoughts running in mad directions, toward dark fantasies.
I see the train I’m riding into work derailing.
My body mangled beyond recognition.
Or never found.
I see myself stepping into this life.
It isn’t mine exactly, but maybe it’s close enough.
—
In the evening, I’m still sitting on the bench on Eleanor Street across from the brownstone that isn’t mine, watching our neighbors arrive home from work and school.
What a miracle it is to have people to come home to every day.
To be loved.
To be expected.
I thought I appreciated every moment, but sitting here in the cold, I know I took it all for granted. And how could I not? Until everything topples, we have no idea what we actually have, how precariously and perfectly it all hangs together.
The sky darkens.
Up and down the block, the houses light up.
Jason comes home.
I’m in a bad way.
Haven’t eaten all day.
Water hasn’t touched my lips since morning.
Amanda must be losing her mind wondering where I am, but I can’t drag myself away. My life, or at least a devastating approximation of it, is unfolding right across the street.
—
It’s long after midnight when I unlock the door to our hotel room.
The lights are on, the television blaring.
Amanda climbs out of bed, wearing a T-shirt and pajama bottoms.
I close the door softly behind me.
I say, “I’m sorry.”
“You asshole.”
“I had a bad day.”
“You had a bad day.”
“Amanda—”
Charging toward me, she shoves me with both hands as hard as she can, sending me crashing back into the door.
She says, “I thought you’d left me. Then I thought something had happened to you. I had no way to get in touch with you. I started calling hospitals, giving them your physical description.”
“I would never just leave you.”
“How am I supposed to know that? You scared me!”
“I’m sorry, Amanda.”
“Where have you been?”
She has me boxed in against the door.
“I just sat on this bench across the street from my house all day.”
“All day? Why?”
“I don’t know.”
“That isn’t your house, Jason. That isn’t your family.”
“I know that.”
“Do you?”
“I also followed Daniela and Jason on a date.”
“What do you mean you followed them?”
“I stood outside the restaurant where they ate.”
The shame hits me as I say the words.
I push past Amanda into the room, take a seat on the end of my bed.
She comes over and stands in front of me.
I say, “They went to a movie after. I followed them inside. Sat behind them in the theater.”
“Oh, Jason.”