I think somewhere in there I just stopped expecting things, decided it was easier not to. And then a stranger knocked on your door, Marcus said. She made a sound that was almost a laugh. And then a stranger knocked on my door. She agreed.
He looked at her. She was looking at the path in front of them. Families passing. A kid on a bicycle too fast for the path. A dog pulling its owner towards something interesting in the grass.
Normal Saturday afternoon life moving around them like a river. I'm not a stranger, he said. No, she said. That's what makes it complicated. They stayed at the park until 4:30.
On the way back to her apartment, she asked him about Maya. Really? Asked the way she had before with the specific attention of someone who genuinely wanted to know. He told her about the dog negotiation, which was still ongoing. He told her about Maya's math teacher who had called to say Maya had corrected her in front of the class politely but definitively and Marcus wasn't sure whether to be proud or apologetic.
He landed on proud. Olivia said she sounds exactly like you. People keep saying that. Marcus said I can't tell if it's a compliment. It is.
She said absolutely. He pulled up to her building. He put the truck in park. She didn't get out right away. Thank you for today.
She said. "Thanks for saying yes," he said. Another one of those silences, the specific kind. She was looking at her hands in her lap. He was looking straight ahead.
And the thing that was between them, the thing that had been growing, then she copied since the kitchen table and the coffee and the folder and the washer and the diner and the park was right there in the cab of the truck, completely present. Neither of them pretending it wasn't. Marcus, she said, "Yeah." She turned and looked at him. I don't know how to do this slowly, she said. I tried to do things slowly before.
I was so careful. I was patient and measured and I gave things room to develop properly. A pause and it still broke. So, I don't know. I don't know if slow is the answer or if it's just delayed fear.
He turned and looked at her. I'm not asking you to be slow, he said. I'm asking you to be honest. That's all. Whatever pace is honest.
She held his gaze. Then she said, "Okay, one word." But the way she said it was the way Daniel had said it across the diner table. Quiet and full and settled, she got out. He watched her walk to the building door. She didn't look back, but at the door, she paused just for a second in the specific way of a woman who was deciding whether to look back.