The Godfather's Heartbroken Lover novel · Chapter 21 of 24

Chapter 21: The Answer

I took my hand out of my pocket.

The key lay on my palm between us.

I didn't give it to him yet.

I wanted him to hear it first, not see it.

"You're the best man I've ever met," I said.

Konrad closed his eyes.

"That's how they always start," he said. "Go on."

"I mean it. I'm not saying it to soften anything."

I made myself look straight at him.

"You asked me first, every time. You came down to the street and stood next to me."

He looked at the floor.

"You let me be honest and you didn't punish me for it," I said. "I'll be grateful for that my whole life."

"But."

"But it's no."

He didn't move.

Behind him on the sofa, his daughter turned over in her sleep and the yellow taxi fell onto the rug.

"It's not because he's changed," I said. "I don't know yet if he has."

"Maybe he's carrying pianos to feel good about himself."

"Maybe."

"It's because when I'm with you, I'm calm and grateful, and part of me is still on a staircase in the dark."

He didn't look away.

"You told me you don't want to be the man I'm thinking past," I said. "You'd be him. Every Sunday. And you'd know."

He opened his eyes.

"I would know," he agreed quietly.

"And she would know. Someday." I looked at the girl on the sofa. "She deserves a woman who isn't looking at a door."

That was the one that hurt him.

I saw it land.

He looked at his daughter for a long moment.

Then he let out a breath, very slowly, and unfolded his arms.

"Okay," he said.

"Okay?"

"Okay. You were honest. That was the deal." He held out his hand, palm up.

I put the key in it.

He closed his fingers around it and put it in his jeans pocket without looking at it.

"I'm going to be sad for a while," he said. "Don't take it personally when I'm short with you on the stairs."

"I'll take it personally."

"Good." The corner of his mouth moved, just slightly. "Your aunt still calls me about the smoke alarm. I'm still coming."

"She'd never forgive you if you didn't."

"And you'll make the cake next year. Twelve layers."

"With a better horse."

"Don't make it better."

He bent and picked the yellow taxi up off the rug and set it by his daughter's hand.

"She loves the dog."

I went to him and put my arms around him.

He held me for a long moment, his chin on top of my head.

Then he let go first.

"Go on," he said. "You know where he lives. Everyone in this building knows where he lives. The woman with the notebook has the address."

I laughed and it came out broken.

At the door I turned around.

He was already picking up paper plates.

"Konrad."

He looked up.

"Thank you for the chair," I said.

He knew what I meant.

He nodded once, and I closed his door very gently, the way he'd closed it on me.

The room in Wedding was over a laundromat on a street of plane trees and parked bicycles.

I rang the bell at nine-thirty at night.

I could hear the dryers turning through the floor.

He came down himself and opened the street door in a T-shirt and jeans, with the paper horse tail still pinned to his back pocket.

He saw my face.

He didn't say anything.

He didn't reach for me.

He stood there and waited for me to decide, the way I'd told him to.

"You've still got your tail on," I said.

He reached back and found it and pulled it off and looked at it.

"I told him no," I said. "Konrad. Just now."

His jaw moved.

"Because of me?"

"Because of me."

He nodded slowly.

Then he said it.

On the doorstep, under a buzzing street light, with a paper horse tail in his hand.

"I love you, Klara."

I stood very still.

"I should have said it five years ago in Carroll Gardens, over the last slice of your mother's cake," he said. "And every day after."

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