Spring came and the city changed color and I began to build a life that did not include him. I took a new client and I started running in the mornings and I went to visit my mother twice a month instead of once. I rebuilt the shape of my weeks around things I had chosen, and it was astonishing how much room there was when I stopped making space for a person who did not show up.
But he came back. Of course he did. That was the other thing the test didn't tell you, that absence loves a person who has stopped waiting. He called in April, four weeks after the coffee shop, and he left a voicemail. He called again a week later. The second message was different. He said he had ended things with Renee. He said he had realized what he had lost. He said he wanted to try again, and he asked if I wou
