This Is Not How It Ends(88)

He reached for my hand, and I heard Claudia singing. A shiver rippled through me when she was joined by one of the male waiters and they began a duet that led me back in time. This was the moment when I knew Philip had found me. Some people believed their loved ones reached them through electrical surges—lights flickering—and others saw birds or rainbows. Philip found me through song.

“When Philip and I met,” I began, fixed on the moon glossing the water, “I was watching a movie on the plane. As cheesy as this sounds, it was the remake of Endless Love.” I thought back to that day on the airplane. Margaret, our seatmate. How he’d argued with me about wanting what we couldn’t have. He’d changed my fundamental beliefs. He’d made it so I didn’t know the answer to the question once asked. Because right now I wanted Ben. Even though Philip’s soul pumped through my veins, I wanted Ben. And I missed Philip with every fiber of my being, but I wanted Ben. Again and again and again.

The feelings mingled with the breeze that cooled my skin. Our fingers clasped harder. I couldn’t tell Ben I thought about that night every single day. And I couldn’t tell him that maybe we were the kind, like many before us, who wanted what they couldn’t have, the ones who were never truly free to love. That letting each other go was the better ending, the antithesis of fairy tale bestselling bullshit.

Ben began to understand the song Claudia was singing. There was a line about fools.

“We were those fools, Ben.”

The wind picked up, and my shawl flapped in the breeze.

“Maybe we were, Charlotte. Maybe it was all a big mistake, but I’ll never be sure. I’ll never believe you found me in that market and saved my son’s life, Sari’s son’s life, without good cause, without it meaning something far bigger than the two of us.”

If, in that precise moment, Ben had continued down the path that led to me, to us, I might not have resisted. I’d have taken him in—mind, body, and soul—without looking back.

But he didn’t.

“I want you to find what you’re looking for, Charlotte. I thought I knew what that was, but I was wrong.”

I shook my head and dropped his hand. “It doesn’t matter what I want. I’m too broken to love anyone right now.”

“I’d have given up anything for you. You know that. You’ve always known that.”

There was no sense arguing with him.

“I love you, Charley. I’ll always love you.”

I started to cry, hearing him call me that name. Big, sloppy tears dripped down my face.

He wrapped an arm around me, and I smelled his breath on my cheeks, his skin so close to mine I could hide there and never come out. But we’d missed our chance. I was letting Ben go.

Silence engulfed us, and I was sorry I’d worn pale blue. “I’m going to miss you, Ben. I already miss you. Go to New York. With Claudia. And build that restaurant. And love Jimmy, with enough love for two.” My voice began to shake. “I’ll never forget you. I’ll never forget the three of us. How blessed I was to have been loved by two remarkable men. Some people never know that kind of love . . .”

He dusted sand off his jeans. His hair blew in the breeze, and I stopped myself from tucking the wisps back into place. His eyes glistened in the moonlight, and we spoke volumes without saying a word. And just as quickly as Ben had entered my life, he was gone.





CHAPTER 42

January–May 2019

When Philip died, I’d felt an immediate absence. With Ben, it took weeks of slowly losing him. In some ways, Philip’s absence fit me like a glove, snug and familiar, but without Ben, there was a different void, one that came with shattered possibilities, an infinite number of what-ifs and what-could’ve-beens. Knowing he was in the world and unavailable to me shed a harsh light on all that was lost. On my worst days, I convinced myself we didn’t deserve to love again, that we were doomed to fail, and on my best days, I sealed him up in a box and moved on with my life.

Throwing myself into work came easily while I applied for certification to teach in a Monroe County classroom. A job had opened up, and when the call came through, I practically cried, realizing how much I had missed the children—my students—the ones who taught me more than I could ever teach them. I promised Liberty I’d help out at the clinic whenever I could, but it was hard to be there, remembering Jimmy, remembering Philip, remembering Ben. Liberty said I had a way with kids. “They’d be lucky to have you.” I’d been struggling with my purpose, and the call came at the right time. If I stayed with Liberty, they’d always be her patients. I needed something of my own. The classroom had always been gratifying and fulfilling, a piece that had been missing for some time.

It was six months to the day Philip passed that I was driving down US 1 and took note of the sign: “No Passing Zone.” Because of the Keys’ narrow two-lane roads, impatient drivers preferred to shoot past the slower ones. Hundreds of these signs decorated the roadway, warning speeders to avoid an impulsive decision. I hadn’t understood their deeper meaning until reaching the zones where it was safe to pass. There the other sign revealed itself: “Pass with Care.”

As I arrived at Philip’s and my home, Sunny met me at the door and followed me into the bedroom. Pass with care. Philip had passed with care, leaving everything in such precise order that it didn’t occur to me to read through the mountains of paperwork surrounding his estate. I collapsed on the bed, Sunny joining me, licking my face. “You like mustard, Sunny boy? Or is it the turkey? Hmm, boy?”