Wiser Returns

They avoided the coffee shop for three years. It sat between their apartments like

an old photograph, unchanged, waiting, impossible to ignore. Debra passed it

every morning, eyes forward. Alex crossed the street to avoid the windows.

They had loved each other fiercely once. Too fiercely. Words had been said that couldn’t be

swallowed back, and doors closed too hard to reopen quietly. On a rainy Tuesday,

the power went out in her building. On that same Tuesday, his laptop died mid-deadline.

They arrived within minutes of each other, dripping rain onto the same tiled floor.

For a moment, they pretended not to see one another. Then she laughed, soft,