I had spent six months believing I knew exactly how Claire and I began.
I was 25 and nearly done with dating apps.
Claire was 45. She had been different from her very first message. She was direct, funny, and certain about what she wanted.
I was 25 and nearly done with dating apps.
The 20-year age difference made me hesitate, but only briefly.
Our first coffee lasted almost four hours.
She remembered that I hated cinnamon in coffee.
I remembered that she collected terrible refrigerator magnets whenever she traveled.
The 20-year age difference made me hesitate.
By our third date, she knew the name of my boss, my favorite pizza place, and the story behind the scar on my wrist.
With Claire, I had never had to guess what she meant.
Apparently I’d only been guessing where she’d come from.
I had never had to guess what she meant.
***
“So you matched with me because of Nora.”
Claire didn’t dodge it.
“At first, yes.”
I set the photograph on the coffee table.
“Wow.”
“Ethan, I wasn’t trying to trick you into a relationship.”
“You literally recognized me from childhood and didn’t tell me.”
“I know.”
“I wasn’t trying to trick you into a relationship.”
“You went to coffee already knowing who I was.”
“Yes.”
“And I knew nothing.”
She closed her eyes for a second.
“Yes. I meant to tell you that day.”
I picked up the photograph and tapped the newer handwriting.
“You wrote this before you saw me again.”
“I meant to tell you that day.”
I looked at the date on the photograph again.
“Were you ever going to tell me? Where was this taken?”
“The old Pine Street library.”
I frowned.
“Didn’t they gut that place years ago?”
“The original children’s room is still there,” she said. “They rebuilt around it.”
“Didn’t they gut that place years ago?”
Then I could see pieces of it.
Low shelves.
Beanbags.
A paper sun hanging crookedly from a ceiling tile.
I could almost smell the dusty carpet.
Then something else.
Yellow.
I could see pieces of it.
I stared at the picture.
“Her glasses were yellow.”
Claire blinked.
“What?”
“Nora’s glasses. They were yellow.”
Claire looked at the photograph again.
“They were purple.”
“No,” I said. “They were yellow.”
“They were purple.”
Claire stared at me for a second.
Then she laughed.
“She painted them.”
“What?”
“With yellow nail polish. My mother almost lost her mind.”
The image arrived so suddenly I had to sit down.
A girl sitting cross-legged with thick yellow glasses, reading a paperback too close to her face.
The image arrived so suddenly.
I couldn’t remember the title.
But I remembered being annoyed with her.
“You want to go there?” Claire asked.
I looked up.
She caught herself immediately.
“Sorry. Wrong question.”
A beat passed.
“You want to go there?”
