Over lunch they caught up, and upon realizing how much she still didn't know, despite spending hours with him the night before and that morning, it hit Jude how long it had been since they'd been able to communicate without speaking, since he'd known her like the back of his hand, since they'd fit together like puzzle pieces. She tried not to think about the way things used to be, but little things like the way he held his fork, or his habit of swirling the water in his glass and making the ice clink against the side, not to mention the way he kept looking at her, with those blue, blue eyes that had never really left her when she'd left Toronto, kept dredging up memories that were both sweet and painful.

"Have you seen NBR's new building?" Jude asked, mainly just to break the silence. "Jamie sent me pictures, but I haven't actually been back to see it. It looks really nice."

"Yeah, it is. Jamie offered me a job, actually, after I left G Major."

"Really? He never told me that."

Tommy shrugged.

"You didn't take it, though."

He shook his head. "I left Toronto that week and haven't gone back."

She wanted to ask why, but his frown told her pretty clearly he didn't want to talk about it. "But Jamie's good?"

"Last I heard. He and that Zeppelin girl are sweet. It's..." He made a face. "But you've probably talked to him since I have, Jude. How's your family? How's Stuart?"

Jude smiled. "He's good. He met a woman– Mathilde– in Paris, and they moved in together last year. I've only met her a few times, but she's really nice. He's happy. Mum and Don are living in New York, but we don't really talk. And you know how Sadie's been doing, traveling around the world with Darius. How is Kwest? Jamie told me he's producing at NBR now."

"He took the break up with Sadie pretty hard. The whole Darius thing..." Tommy laughed darkly. "We spent a lot of nights trying to drink ourselves into oblivion, right after." Jude winced. "But he started writing letters to Portia, of all people, and it helped him a lot. Her too, probably. Jamie giving him the job helped too. He and Sadie are even civil now. You know, he's Kwest. He's a good guy. He's renting my loft. He dated some. He bounced back."

"Did you?" She asked.

"Did I what?"

"Bounce back. Date."

He looked at her for a long time, deciding whether to lie to make her feel better. Instead he ignored the first question and answered the second. "There were women."

"Anything... serious?" Jude tried to make the question sound casual, as though she didn't really care, but the tension came out in her voice.

Tommy looked down at his plate. "Serious has never been my forte." He muttered.

"Tommy..." She sighed sympathetically.

He shook his head and changed the subject, looking back up at her. "Have you heard from Spiederman since he and Karma split the last time?"

Jude rolled her eyes. "They're back together. Kyle and Wally threatened to hold an exorcism. It's like he's addicted, I swear to God. He and I played a show here a few months back, and she'd call him every five minutes to scream about something."

Tommy shook his head, but didn't say anything, contemplating the phrase "like he's addicted." He'd had people tell him that, too. That he and Jude were like addicts, repeatedly being sucked back into something that was nothing but bad for them. They weren't wrong. Jude had been so young when they'd met, he treated her badly, they were dramatic, he tried in vain to keep her from knowing his past, and she somehow always managed to be the one that could get under his skin the fastest. No one would have called their relationship perfect. But it wasn't addiction, didn't feel like addiction, didn't feel destructive, at least not for him. Jude made him better. She'd changed him more than she knew from Little Tommy Q who had been high on fame, living in the tabloids, with a different model every night, and from Tom Dutois who had punched people for insulting him, who lived in fear of being weak. She'd broken down walls he'd spent years building. She was good for him. Whether he was good for her was a different story. Alexander was probably better for her, though that thought burned like acid. And if she wasn't better off without him, she wouldn't have left him. Right?

"Are you okay?" Jude asked.

"What? Yeah. Just thinking."

"About what?"

"Nothing."

Years of this response had taught Jude to suck it up and accept that Tommy would always be a private person, and leaving had taken any justification she had for wanting to be the exception to that. She stared at him for a moment, but nodded. Her phone vibrated in her pocket. "Just a sec. Nora said she might text."

It was Alexander, she recognized before seeing the name, who was the only one she knew who texted in complete and capitalized sentences. "How did the interview go?"

"ok" she responded, and received his reply shockingly quickly for its length.

"Did they ask about you and Quincy? Am I going to hear the bad news from the tabloids?"

"i said its nothing. its nothing. lay off" She rolled her eyes and put her phone back in her purse.

"Nora?" Tommy asked.

"Alexander." She replied.

"He's being weird about my being here, isn't he?" Tommy guessed.

"Sort of, I guess." She sighed. "Wouldn't you be?"

Tommy shrugged. "Maybe. But I wouldn't harass you every five minutes about it..." He raised his eyebrows, recalling her comment about Karma.

She couldn't decide whether to be amused or defensive, but her phone went off again and she grabbed it. Alex replied "That was a joke, Jude. No need to be upset. Sorry about that."

"hard to tell in text :P sry"

When she looked up from the phone, Tommy said "Tell me about Alexander."

Jude looked surprised. It was the last thing she expected him to ask. "What about him?"

Tommy shrugged. "Whatever."

"You really want to know?"

"Sure." Tommy just wanted something to humanize the man, to prove that Alexander was better for Jude than Tommy himself was, as if that would allow him closure, let him move on and stop this helpless hopeless wishing.

"I... don't really know what to tell you. He's a good person. He's sweet, but that can get... clingy. He's sort of like Jamie, I guess, in a lot of ways. He's smart, and he's kind... He puts his heart into everything he does. He cooks, too, which is good because I burn water." She smiled in spite of herself. "He has this really bizarre sort of nerdy sense of humor that I think I only get about half the time. I guess we're very... different. But it's a good different. Or I think it is. His parents hate everything about me." She shook her head.

"Are you happy?" Tommy asked, looking down at his hands with a frown.

Jude couldn't answer the question as easily as she would have thought. "He... he really loves me, and I never have to question that." She said quietly. "I love him. Yes. I'm happy."

Tommy squeezed his eyes shut for a moment, then looked up and said "Good."

Jude's phone vibrated again. It was Alex, calling this time. She was tempted to ignore it, but Tommy nodded at her to answer it, and got out his own phone, checking his e-mail. "Hey. What's up?" she said into the phone.

"I just missed you. Wanted to talk."

"Oh."

"Did I interrupt your lunch?"

"Um... yeah..."

"Are you having a good time?"

"Sure."

"I was wondering if I could come find you for dinner."

"Both of us?" Tommy was politely pretending not to listen, but was focusing a little too intently on his cell phone screen.

"Sure. I could bring Emily. Unless you don't want to..." She could hear him pouting through the phone.

"I'll ask him." she gave in, feeling guilty.

"Great!" Alex said brightly. "I have to go, but I'll call later okay?"

"Alright."

"I love you."

"Yep." Jude was hyperaware of Tommy, whose eyes were on her now.

"Is everything alright?"

"Yeah. I'll talk to you later."

She hung up, and Tommy asked "Ask me what?"

"Um... If Alex could, uh, join us for dinner. I think he's bringing Emily too."

He surprised her by shrugging. "If he wants, sure."

"Really?"

Tommy nodded, out of something that may have been masochism, or maybe just a desire to prove that Jude was better off this way. Hell, maybe he just wanted to make her feel weird, make her admit things were complicated between them.

She hesitated, then said "If you're sure..." and texted Alexander, who responded exuberantly. She said. "Thanks for that."

"Hm? Oh, sure."

Tommy was staring at his almost empty plate, and Jude felt suddenly stifled, like she was suffocating on the past and on his unhappiness. She needed to escape this gloom and guilt. "Can we get out of here?" She asked. Tommy nodded, and Jude flagged down a waitress. "I have somewhere I'd like to show you."