The Love We Missed novel · Chapter 22 of 24

Chapter 22: Two A.M.

I didn't go to bed.

I sat on the swing in my coat until one-thirty with the street dark and the snow going blue under the streetlight.

Nobody made me.

I just wanted to.

At five to two, I parked on Bryant Street.

The dining room was dark, but the light was on in the kitchen, and the back door in the alley was unlocked.

Ciaran was at the stove in a T-shirt with a dish towel over his shoulder.

The kitchen smelled like butter and browning cheese.

He didn't turn around.

"Sit," he said. "Two minutes."

I sat on the stool by the pass, where Nellie colored on Sundays.

There was a crayon drawing taped to the wall above it of a man with enormous arms.

He took the skillet out of the oven with a towel and set it on the steel in front of me.

Baked mac and cheese, the crumbs browned dark, flecked with red.

He handed me a fork.

"You made this for me every night that year," he said. "I never got to eat one."

"You sent me one on my anniversary."

"That was to get your attention."

"It worked."

He sat on the other side of the counter.

I took the first bite, and it was exactly right, and I closed my eyes.

"Better than mine," I said.

"That's a lie."

"It's a little bit true."

He smiled with his crooked tooth.

Then he reached into his back pocket, took out his phone and slid it across the steel to me.

It was unlocked.

"What's this?"

"For thirteen years, I wrote to you, and you wrote back to him," he said. "I'd like to hear from you. Text me something. Anything."

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