Total pages in book: 36
Estimated words: 34995 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 175(@200wpm)___ 140(@250wpm)___ 117(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 34995 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 175(@200wpm)___ 140(@250wpm)___ 117(@300wpm)
The person who has nothing to do with me.
He turns slightly, and for a second I think he's looking at me through the window. But his eyes are unfocused. He's not seeing the café. He's not seeing me. He's somewhere else entirely.
Another minute passes. Maybe two. I've stopped counting.
Then he nods at whatever the person said. Says something short—agreement, maybe, or acknowledgment—and ends the call.
He stands there for a moment. Staring at his phone. His shoulders are tight. His jaw is still clenched.
Then he looks up at the café.
Sees me watching.
And something crosses his face—guilt, maybe? Regret? I can't tell because it's gone too fast, replaced by that neutral professional mask.
He comes back inside. Snow in his hair again. Cold air following him. He closes the door, and the café feels different now. Smaller. Or maybe just colder.
"I have to go," he says.
"Okay."
"There is—" He stops. Starts again. "Something has come up. With the team. I need to—" Another stop. "I am sorry."
"It's fine."
"It is not fine." He looks at the table where we were sitting. At the space where our hands were linked just minutes ago. "We were—I did not want to leave like this."
"It's okay. Really." I force a smile. The professional one. The invisible one. "Go. Do what you need to do."
He's studying me now. Really looking at me. And I can see him trying to read my expression, trying to figure out if I mean it, if I'm okay, if this is going to send me back into hiding.
"Tomorrow?" he asks finally.
"I'm working."
"I know. I will see you tomorrow? Seven-twenty-three?"
"Okay."
He takes a step toward me. Then stops. Like he's remembering something. Remembering that phone call maybe. Remembering whatever cold professional thing he needs to be.
He reaches for me anyway. His hand lifts toward mine—that same palm-up gesture from earlier—and then he catches himself. His hand hovers in the air between us for a second.
Then it drops.
"I—" He stops. Tries again. "I wish I did not have to go."
"I know."
"Do you?"
"Yeah." And I do. I can see it in his face—the frustration, the conflict, the way he's torn between whatever that phone call was and this moment right here. "Go. It's fine."
He looks at me for a long moment. Then: "I am not good at this."
"At what?"
"At—" He gestures between us. "Being two people at once. Being the driver and being—" He stops. "Just being Santino."
"I know."
"Do you?" His voice has gone quieter. Almost urgent. "Because I need you to know—what you saw just now, on the phone—that is not—" He makes a frustrated sound. "That is the part of my life I am trying to leave behind. But it is not easy. It follows me."
"I know," I say again.
"Tomorrow," he says. "I will explain tomorrow. About the phone call. About—everything. I promise."
"You don't have to—"
"I do." He takes another step toward me, and now he's close enough that I could reach out and touch him if I wanted to. "I do not want you thinking—" He stops. "Please. Just—tomorrow. Let me explain tomorrow."
"Okay."
Some of the tension leaves his shoulders. "Seven-twenty-three." He reaches out again—and this time he doesn't stop. His hand finds mine. Squeezes once. "Goodnight, Thea."
"Goodnight, Santino."
He lets go. Steps back. Walks to the door.
He pauses with his hand on the handle. Looks back at me one more time.
"I meant what I said," he says quietly. "About wanting to find out where this goes."
Then he's gone.
The door closes. I watch through the window as he walks to his car, gets in, sits there for a moment before starting the engine.
Then he drives away, and I'm standing in the empty café with my hand still tingling from that last squeeze and this question echoing in my head:
Which version of you is real?
The one who told me about factory jobs and go-karts and being seen?
Or the one who just walked away looking like all that warmth was something he could turn on and off with a switch?
I finish closing. Lock the door. Count the register. Turn off the lights.
And I try not to think about the fact that for twenty minutes, sitting at a table with our hands linked, I let myself believe again.
But then that phone rang.
And the professional version of him came back.
And I'm not sure which one I'm going to see tomorrow at
seven-twenty-three.
I drive home counting streetlights (forty-three from the café to my apartment), and I try to convince myself that tomorrow will be different.
That tomorrow he'll come back, and the warmth will be real, and the phone call won't matter.
But I saw his face when he answered that call.
I saw the way the warmth just—vanished.
Like it was never there at all.
And I don't know which scares me more:
That he can turn it off that easily.
Or that I'm already hoping he'll turn it back on tomorrow.