Hello faithful readers! Drove about 14 hours yesterday. As much as I give poor Alexander some of my traits, there's plenty of me in John, too. At one point, my love wakes up from napping in the passenger seat to find me, cruise control on, legs tucked criss cross, steering with my knees, hands occupied with tying my hair back, bopping to the music. He just went back to sleep. I've never totalled a Beemer, though.

This was mostly written on my phone, so give me some grammatical grace. Welcome new readers, hello again, old friends. Thank you for reading and for reviewing. I love to hear your thoughts. Shadow, dear one, never apologize for lengthy reviews. I pour over every word and am thrilled to hear all of your thoughts and the nuances you find. Don't edit for self consciousness, the long reviews are a drug to me!

I was never more grateful for my ability to compartmentaliseatze when work was present than I was over the course of the morning, I slammed coffee, letting the caffeine compound my anxiousness. I had plenty of writing to do which kept my mind and my hands entertained as I scrawled in my notebook. I checked the time on my computer monitor.

"Hey, James, got a lunch, thing, gonna head if that's cool?"

"Sounds good, where are you going?"

Lie. Lie. Lie. This is weird, you can't say, 'to the park to meet the girl I knocked up.'

"Um… to the deli?"

"Which one?"

"Uh… Andy's?"

"Ooh, good stuff. Bring me back a pastrami on rye?"

"Uh… Sure thing.

I wrapped myself up and grabbed a cup of coffee for the road. The park was a quick walk, I tried to keep my steps even and sure. I could walk this path in my sleep, straight to our bench. I'm not sure when it became ours, but either way it was. We spent hours on that stupid bench, talking about everything, assignments at school, her family, how I got to New York, my writing, practicing my cross examination debate arguments, where we'd live, what we'd name our baby - Phillip if it was a boy, Angelica if it was a girl - it's where she told me her father was making her move upstate, it was the last place I ever saw her.

I sat and waited, the bench faced away from the path, overlooking the pond. My fingers drummed of their own volition against my bobbing knee. I let a cigarette and leaned forward, trying to remember how to breathe. It happened so fast, she was there, standing before me. I dropped my cigarette and stamped it under my foot, rising to greet her.

"Alex..." her voice caught, she kept her head high, I watched her breaths heave in her chest.

"Eliza…" I fidgeted my hands, unsure what to do with them.

She sat beside me. Silence clung between us, the shadows of all the conversations had on this bench surrounded us with the ferocity of poltergeists. The silence drug on, the only sound was my thumb and pinky drumming on the planks of the bench in the space between us. Time meant nothing, hours and seconds passed in the same tick of a clock. Her hand, smooth and warm and delicate covered mine, stilling the percussion. She broke the silence.

"I never expected how quiet the night time could be until we moved out of the city."

I blew out a breath, staring at the half finished cigarette at my feet. Her thumb started to move over the back of my hand. I stared out at the water, grey and still under the fog.

I opened my mouth to speak, but my throat was too dry to let out the words, I swallowed and tried again, "I'm sorry."

"I am, too."

"You didn't do anything wrong."

"The... cheating."

"We were kids, we were coping the best we knew how to."

"I loved you."

She slid closer to me and put her head where it still fit perfectly on my shoulder, "I loved you, too, Alex."

"I know there's no replacing what we lost-"

She quieted my voice with her own, "-I just needed time."

I nodded, tears stinging cold in the wind as they tracked my cheeks. She sniffled beside me, rubbing her eyes on my shoulder.

"I've thought about you all these years. What I would say, what I would do. Written you letters, so many letters."

"You always did. You built me palaces out of paragraphs. I saved each one."

I smiled a little and sniffled, "you kept them?"

"For a while," she admitted, "then it just hurt too much… I burned them all on our anniversary. Couldn't have you and your words, they flooded my senses. All the time, just reading them, missing you, missing everything, wanting our lives back, left with only the memories of when you were mine."

"Good." I worked to calm my breathing, she moved her hand from mine and threaded her arm around mine, holding onto my bicep.

"Angelica told me you seem happy? Are you happy, Alex?"

"I'm happier than I've been in years."

"Good. Do you love him?"

"I do. I love him so much. Haven't loved anyone else like that since you. Just you and him."

"Do you write him letters?"

I thought about it, guilt creeping in, "no. I haven't written any one else letters like that. Just you, Betsey."

She laughed faintly, "no one ever calls me that anymore."

"Sorry. Just slipped out."

"It's okay, Alex. I loved it when you'd call me Betsey."

"I'm sorry things didn't turn out different for you."

"I'm happy, Alex. I am. I've helped raise hundreds of children. I get to see them growing up."

"I bet they love you, how could they not?"

"A lot of them remind me of you. It's in their eyes… sometimes I look at a kid, scared, lot of them don't even speak English, parents beside them yesterday, gone now, I just look in their eyes, and I see you, Alexander. I see you every time… how long have you been with him?"

I sensed the change in subjects, "about eight or nine months. John."

"He's good to you?"

"So good. Saved me from myself. I don't know how I deserve someone so good. You're lucky to get someone so good once, I don't know what I did to get it to happen to me twice."

"You're right… most people only get it once."

"Eliza, no, I was not that for you. I was not good to you like you were and like John is for me. There is someone out there who will be your goodness."

She lifted her head from my shoulder and wiped her face, "what do you want now, is this it? Does-does John know you're here? I would hate for him to…"

"He knows… I'm not like that anymore." Really? You have any room to pretend to be on a high horse?

"I bet he's wonderful. What's he like?"

"Betsey, you don't want to…"

"Don't 'Betsey' me, Alexander. I want to know about him. Want to make sure you're happy."

"He's… he's beautiful, he's so compassionate, just like you, he's silly, he… he makes me like myself again, I spent so many years hating myself. He… he's a photographer, an artist, really, he makes the most beautiful art, he's got all these freckles, like so many, it's wild, I love every one of them. He's so tall, so tall, I feel like a midget next to him, and he's got all this hair, thick curls, so much hair. He works at the Post, I worked there for a long time, that's where we met. He loves to sing and dance, he's a good dancer. He's from South Carolina, but his family is Puerto Rican like me." I prattled on, gushing about him, smile beaming.

"You do love him."

She turned to look at me. I faced her and truly saw her for the first time in years, she was still just as beautiful as the last time I saw her. Black trench coat closed up to her neck, hair pulled back in a ponytail, her features still so showstopping, dark eyes trained on me. My heart stuttered.

"So where do we go from here?"

"I miss you, Alex. I have for all these years, I love that you've built a life for yourself, but I miss my best friend. You were more than my first love, you were my confidant. I selfishly held out hope for years that our paths would cross in some coffee shop, with you it would be a coffee shop, and things would pick up where they left off. There is no 'where they left off' anymore, but I do want to be a part of the narrative… if you'd let me. Just… if I could be your friend… that would be enough."

Her fingers found a strand of my hair, blowing in the wind and fiddled with it between her fingers like she used to do when she was nervous.

"Of course, mi corazón. I don't have too many friends." I smiled at her.

She pulled her hands into her lap and stared at them, "I know how weird and dumb it is… but I'd love to meet John."

"Not weird or dumb. I'm sure he'd love that. I talk about you a lot."

"Don't do that, you've got a good thing, Alex. Don't waste it on talking about the past."

"You're not just my past, Betsey, you were my world. Walk with me?"

"Of course."

We stood and started down the path, falling into lockstep. From muscle memory our hands found each other as we walked and everything was okay. If I'd given John the keys to the jail cells where I'd locked up my demons and he'd let them out, being with Eliza excised them completely.

We made it to the exit that I'd come in through, I hugged her tightly and took in the scent of dewy roses, that hadn't changed either. She leaned up and kissed my cheek, I thumbed her cheekbones.

"I love you, Alex. Some part of me always will."

"I love you, Eliza. Always will." I hugged her again.

"I'll see you soon."

"I can't wait."

"I can't wait to meet John!"

"He's going to be thrilled."

We turned and walked away from each other, forward through time, closing the gap of all the years between us. I was amazed at how I could hold such love for her, but love so cooled off. My heart welcomed her back in, just to the sliver left in the space didn't occupy, the historical place he couldn't fit into, too new, too angular, too tall and broad, no, this space was for her, soft, small, warm.

I worked the rest of the day, disappointing James with a lie that the deli was out of pastrami. I wrapped up my project, topped off my coffee and set off for home wrapped in my coat. John was already waiting when I got there.

"Hi, babe! How was it?" he wrapped his arms around me.

I melted into him, needed to be held by him, to let his warm amber smell time travel me to the present, to us.

"Alex, babe, you okay? You gonna tell me how it went or just keep sniffing me?"

I squeezed him again and pulled away, not realizing the dampness of my face. John's eyebrows knit together and he cupped my face.

"Come here, darlin', let's go curl up, you can tell me what happened." He peeled my coat off and guided us to the bedroom.

I lie straight as a board, precisely on my half of the bed. I didn't see it, but I felt him roll his eyes as he drug my stiff body into his. Even as he surrounded me I refused to concede, staring at the ceiling, back straight, hands at my sides.

"Alex," he cooed, sweeping my hair back.

We stayed like that for a long time, the low winter sun dying through the window, I finally spoke.

"She doesn't hate me or find me repugnant. For all the years of our separation, I never thought that she would - it would be in direct opposition of her character - but I desired her loathing, pined for her castigation. I've spent my time in her absence hating myself with great enough measure for both of us. It was so good to see her, to be reminded of the previous time when my life was not shrouded in the mourning veil which you've removed. She made the request to be a part of my life. I've decided to accept her request. It was also among her requests to meet you. A bizarre and self flagellatory request as I am happily committed with a partner to fill my time whereas she finds only solitude." I licked my lips as I finished my diatribe, tasting the fleeting words.

He grinned and kissed my nose, "it's so enchanting when you do that; sit quietly, mouth forming silent words, face deep in thought and then you prepare yourself, I can see it happen. Then when open your mouth you talk the way you write, more formal than anyone born in the last 200 years. I fall more and more in love with you when you talk that way… even though I don't really know what all those words mean."

His eyes were so soft, pupils blown to see me in the lowlight, hair framing his face as he hung over me. I wrapped my arms around his, seeking the solace of the space in his chest that felt sculpted for me.

"Do you want to meet her?"

"Sure, I mean, is that weird for you? I don't want you to be uncomfortable, but, she's a part of you, Alexander. Everything happens for a reason. Maybe she's found her way back into your life for a reason."

"Maybe." I set my ear into the hollow of his chest and listened to the beating of his heart, the rhythm soothing, calm, but so loud, betraying the confidence of his ribs, telling of his fire and passion.

"Don't go falling asleep on me now. We still haven't had dinner."

"Not hungry." I nuzzled in closer and let sleep wash over me.