Chapter 24: Group Three

At gate B14, with my boarding pass in my hand, I watched my best friend take a picture of me.

She was standing six feet away, in the red coat and the mustard sweater, holding her phone up with both hands.

"Don't look at the camera," Mallory said. "Look at him."

I looked at Willem.

He was sitting on the gate chair beside me with a diaper bag on his knee, which he had insisted on carrying, in case.

He looked back at me, and I forgot what I was supposed to be doing with my face.

The shutter clicked.

"Perfect," said Mallory. "Posting."

"Mal."

"It's tasteful."

"It better be."

My phone buzzed in my coat pocket, and the whole gate saw me flinch.

It wasn't her.

I took it out and read it standing up.

It was Edgar, from a number I had not blocked on purpose.

It was 6:41.

"Gin. I'm sorry for everything. Let's talk. You know you always come back."

I looked at the words for a while.

A gate agent was setting up the microphone at the desk.

Outside the window, a plane was backing off its stand with a long, slow groan.

Three weeks earlier I would have stood at this same gate with my thumb over the screen and my throat tight.

I would have written something long and fair and kind, and then I would have deleted it.

Mallory came and read it over my shoulder.

"Delete nothing," she said.

"I know the rules."

I thought about it.