Chapter 32: Ask Me Again

At six in the morning on the sixth of June, Albany International Airport smelled of coffee and floor wax.

Clara stood at the barrier of the arrivals hall with a square of white cardboard held over her head.

It said FERRIS, in her own slanted handwriting.

Under it, in smaller print: PLEASE BE MILES.

Beth stood on her left, in a Boston sweatshirt, holding a bag of airport pastries.

Hannah stood on her right with a clipboard, for reasons she had not explained.

"Eleven minutes late," Hannah said, checking the board.

"They landed," said Beth. "It says landed."

"Landed is not the same as out."

"You are so stressful."

"I run a bookshop. I've earned it."

Clara said nothing.

Her knees had stopped working again around the time the first passengers came through the doors.

A man in a suit. A woman with a stroller. A line of students in matching shirts.

The doors slid open and shut, open and shut, and each time the world held still.

Then they slid open on a tall man in a blazer worn white at the elbows, with a blue duffel on his shoulder.

His hair was shorter.

He had gotten brown and thin.

He had clearly been awake for twenty hours and meant to stay on his feet.

He saw the sign.

He stopped dead in the doorway, so that a woman behind him bumped his back and said sorry in two languages.

Clara lowered the cardboard.

For a moment neither of them moved.

Then Miles dropped the duffel and crossed the hall at a run.