Nate was early again.
He sat on the low wall beside the old beach steps, with the paper bag between his feet. When Lena came toward him he stood up, then seemed unsure whether standing was too much.
She was wearing her ordinary jeans and the shoes she'd worn all day. Before leaving the café she'd considered going home to change. She hadn't. She didn't want to spend the walk wondering which version of herself she'd dressed for him.
“Hi,” he said.
“Are you going to buy me another coffee?”
“No. I've retired from that.”
“Good.”
He looked down at the bag. “Do you want this now?”
“Let's walk.”
They went along the seawall, away from the busiest stretch of harbour. The tide was low. Beyond the sand lay a dark strip of wet stones where children were overturning rocks with solemn concentration.
For the first few minutes neither spoke. Lena listened to their feet. He walked a little faster than she did, slowed, sped up again, then finally found her pace.
She used to like that he couldn't stand still. Nate wanted to see what was around the next corner, whether a closed gate was really locked, what would happen if they took the bus all the way to its last stop. She had felt adventurous beside him even on days when they went nowhere.
Now his restlessness made her want to put a hand out and stop him.
“What happened?” she asked.
He glanced at her.
“When you left. Not the ring. Tell me what happened.”
He moved the bag into his other hand.
“I got the tour job. The one I'd been trying for.”
“I remember.”
“I thought I'd have another month. They wanted me there that week. I said yes before I knew how to tell you.”
“You could have started with those words.”
“Yes.”
A cyclist rang a bell behind them. They stepped aside. Nate waited for Lena to move back before he did.
“I kept thinking if I saw you, I'd change my mind,” he said. “Or I'd ask you to come, and you'd say yes because you loved me, and neither of us would think about what it meant.”
“I might have said no.”
“I know.”
“You don't know. You didn't ask.”
He nodded. She could see him wanting to defend something, searching for a place to put it, then giving up.
“What about the ring?”
“I picked it up the day before I left.”
She stopped walking.
“You'd already taken the job?”
“Yes.”
“And you still went to get it?”
“It was paid for.”
Lena stared at him.
He flinched. “I know how that sounds.”
“How should it sound?”
“Like I didn't know what I was doing.”
“No. You knew exactly what you were doing that day. You went to work. You collected a ring. You packed a bag.”
“Yes.”
“And I went to the flat after my shift and you weren't there.”
He looked at the sea.
“Your key was on the table,” she said. “Not a note. A key.”
“I was a coward.”
She wanted that word to do something. It was one she'd used herself, alone, often enough. Hearing him say it didn't return the evenings she had spent checking her phone.
“I called you.”
“I know.”
“For weeks.”
“I know.”
“Stop saying you know.”
He turned toward her. His face was pale under its summer colour.
“I saw the calls. At first I thought I'd answer when I had something better to say. Then every day made it worse. I put the phone in a drawer before work. When I changed my number later, I told myself you'd be better without me.”
“You told yourself.”
“Yes.”
Lena looked away. A little boy on the sand was holding something up to his father. The father went down on one knee to examine it. She watched them because she couldn't bear looking at Nate for another moment.
“You didn't get to decide that I was better.”
“No.”
The wind pushed her hair across her mouth. She pulled it away.
She'd expected an explanation with a shape she could hold. A misunderstanding. Another woman. A disaster he'd been too ashamed to tell her. There had only been a job he wanted and a conversation he hadn't wanted enough to endure.
“Did you think about coming back?”
“Yes.”
“Why didn't you?”
“The same reason. I didn't want to stand here and have you look at me like this.”
“At least that's honest.”
“It should have been honest five years ago.”
They started walking again. Lena didn't know why. She could have gone home. But she'd asked for this conversation, and if she ended it at the point where it hurt most, she would still carry the questions.
At a little kiosk farther along the wall, a woman was closing the hatch around the day's last tray of pastries.
Nate stopped. “Have you eaten?”
“Yes.”
Her stomach made a small, clear sound.
He didn't smile.
“Bread crust,” she admitted. “And three grapes.”
“Can I buy you something?”
“I can buy myself something.”
“Okay.”
She went to the hatch. There was one cheese pastry left and a small bag of sugared doughnuts. She bought both, then stood trying to arrange her change, pastry and bag without dropping anything.
Nate held out a hand for the bag. She hesitated, gave it to him and kept the pastry.
They walked down the steps to the beach. Lena bit into the pastry while it was still warm. A long piece of melted cheese stretched from her mouth to the paper.
“Don't say it,” she warned.
“I wasn't going to.”
“You were.”
“I was remembering how dignified you've always been.”
She tried not to laugh and lost the fight. Cheese landed on her jacket. She shut her eyes.
He handed her a clean paper napkin without ceremony.
“Useful,” she said.
“Briefly.”
They sat on the lowest step, where the wind couldn't reach their hands. Lena finished the pastry. Nate put the doughnuts between them. Neither pretended this had become a date.
“What do you do now?” she asked.
“Lighting. Mostly theatres, some concerts. Smaller jobs between.”
“You stayed with it.”
“Yes.”
“Are you good?”
He considered. “Better at that than this.”
“That isn't saying much.”
“No.”
He didn't turn the answer into a joke again. She liked that he let it stop.
“Do you still draw?” he asked.
She looked at him. “Sometimes.”
“You drew every place we went.”
“I drew three places badly and you kept asking for more.”
“I liked them.”
She had once drawn him asleep on a train. His nose had come out enormous, and he had carried the folded paper in his wallet for six months until it fell apart. She remembered the wallet now, the cracked brown edge, the little slot where the picture had been.
“I do the boards at work,” she said. “Flowers round prices. Jo lets me get away with the occasional boat.”
“Have you drawn the café?”
“About twenty times.”
“You could make postcards.”
“I don't want everything I like to become another thing we sell.”
He nodded. “Fair.”
The simple answer was new. At twenty-four Nate would have been designing a postcard stand before she'd finished refusing.
A gull came down beside the doughnut bag. Lena moved it between her knees.
Nate pointed toward the harbour. “That one definitely steals jewellery.”
She looked at him despite herself.
They had played this game on the beach years ago: inventing a life for any bird bold enough to stand near them. She used to make the birds florists and traffic wardens. His were all criminals.
“No,” she said. “It sells expensive kitchens.”
“It has a face like a burglar.”
“It has a face like it's told you the cheaper cupboards won't last.”
Nate laughed. The sound moved through her before she could protect herself from it.
A second gull landed a little farther away.
“That's its mother,” he said.
“Accountant.”
“Explains the cold eyes.”
Lena shook her head, smiling, then felt the smile fade.
He saw it. He didn't ask what was wrong.
The bag between his feet rustled as he reached inside. He brought out an old paperback and a small grey box.
“My book.” She took it before he could offer the box.
The cover was bent at the corner. A lighthouse leaned across a painted sea. She'd lent it to him before he left, because she wanted him to understand why she'd stayed awake until two in the morning reading it.
“Did you finish it?”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“On the first tour.”
She turned the pages. Her old pencil lines were still there. At the back she had drawn a small, very bad boat.
Nate held the box in his palm.
She could tell him not to open it. She could make this one thing remain imagined.
“Go on,” she said.
He opened it. The ring was silver, with a small blue stone and two tiny clear ones beside it. It was exactly something she would have chosen at twenty-three. That hurt so unexpectedly she pressed her lips together.
He had known her. Whatever else was true, he had known what would please her.
“It's lovely,” she said.
He looked up too quickly.
“That doesn't make it mine.”
“I know.”
She shook her head. “Don't offer it to me.”
“I won't.”
He closed the box and put it back in the bag.
She touched the ring she already wore. Daniel had asked her on a cold afternoon at home, with a dropped fork still under the table because she'd made him nervous by asking why he was so quiet. He had not let his fear stop him saying the words.
“I'm going home,” she said.
Nate stood when she did.
“Thank you for meeting me.”
“I wasn't doing you a favour.”
“No.”
They climbed the steps together. At the top he stopped, giving her the path back toward the harbour.
She tucked the paperback under her arm. His hand moved as if he might brush something from her sleeve, then stayed at his side.
“Lena,” he said.
She waited.
“I did love you.”
Her throat tightened. She hated that he had saved the words until she was trying to leave.
“I know,” she said. “You still went.”
She walked home with sugar on her fingers and the book pressed against her ribs.