“Near the end of that summer, our mom took Nora out of town for specialized treatment. Everybody thought she’d be gone a few weeks.”
My fingers found a scratch carved into the table.
“And?”
“She got worse.”
“Everybody thought she’d be gone a few weeks.”
I stopped moving my thumb over the scratch.
Claire continued quietly.
“She died that winter.”
I stared toward the shelves.
Somewhere behind us, a child laughed.
For a while, neither of us said anything.
Then I asked, “Nobody told me?”
“No.”
“Nobody told me?”
“But you knew I existed.”
“Yes.”
“You knew who I was when you saw me on Tinder.”
“Yes.”
“So why then?”
Claire looked down at her hands.
“Because I thought I’d finally been given a chance to tell you.”
I waited.
“So why then?”
“I didn’t know your last name for years,” she continued. “I knew Ethan. I knew your mom used to pick you up in a red car. I knew you moved not long after Nora got sick. By the time I thought seriously about finding you, I had almost nothing useful.”
“I didn’t know your last name for years.”
“But eventually you did.”
“Seventeen years later, your face showed up on my phone.”
I rubbed both hands over my jeans.
“And you swiped right.”
“Yes.”
“To tell me Nora died. That was the whole plan?”
“And you swiped right.”
“One coffee. Tell you who I was. Tell you what happened. Thank you for being her friend.”
I looked at her.
“And then?”
Claire gave a tired little laugh.
“Then you ordered another coffee. You stayed until they started stacking chairs around us.”
“Tell you who I was.”
“That doesn’t answer why you lied, Claire.”
“No.”
Good.
At least she didn’t try pretending it did.
I leaned back.
“If Nora had never existed, would you have swiped right on me?”
“That doesn’t answer why you lied, Claire.”
Claire looked at me for several seconds.
“I don’t know.”
It hurt more than a prettier answer would have.
She continued before I could speak.
“I probably wouldn’t have stopped on your profile long enough to find out.”
I looked away.
It hurt more than a prettier answer would have.
“But Nora got me to that coffee shop,” she admitted. “She didn’t make me order another coffee. Or stay until they stacked the chairs around us.”
I stood.
“What happened after that doesn’t erase what happened before it.”
“I know.”
