Chapter 135

I have no idea how to answer that question. “Uh…” I say eloquently, searching for the correct words to satisfy my curious child. There is so much about my relationship with Miles that I can’t share with her. Actually, there’s very little that I can share.

I guess it wouldn’t be unsafe to share, “It just didn’t work out between us.”

“Aww,” Iris says. “I liked him.”

“Me, too,” I tell her.

The line moves forward and it’s our turn to check out. We both get distracted unloading the cart, and we don’t revisit the subject.

On a night when my girls are back at their father’s house, Hugo and I make arrangements for our date. At 7pm sharp, he shows up at my door with a bouquet of freshly-cut flowers. I invite him inside while I grab a vase to put them in water.

He follows me into the kitchen but maintains a several foot distance between us. Respectful, probably. But it also gives the impression that he’s a bit nervous.

In the kitchen, as I fill a vase with water, I dare a look at his face.

His fingers are hooked together, and he’s staring down at them.

“Everything okay?” I ask him. I cut the bottom edges of the flowers and put them into the water in the vase.

“Admittedly, I’m a little nervous,” he says. “It’s... been some time since my last date. And then with how that eventually turned out. I want to do things right.”

Setting the flowers aside, I say, “Me too… I’m sure you know why. Things are complicated with Miles. I…”

“It’s fine,” he says, laughing a little. My uncertainty seems to have lifted his own spirits. “We’re in the same boat, then.”

“Yes, it seems that way,” I tell him. His confidence builds my own. “Why don’t we just concentrate on having a good time? We can figure out the rest after that.”

“Sounds like a good plan,” Hugo says.

With the flowers safe, I follow Hugo out to his car. We’ve already decided which restaurant to go to, a nice mid-price level steakhouse in the suburbs of the city. We wanted somewhere low key where we would be mostly left alone.

People in the suburbs generally didn’t care as much about politics as those who worked and thrived within the city itself. Even though my face has been on the news lately, we had some hope that neither of us would be recognized among people who had their own lives to live.

So far, so good, as we enter the restaurant and are seated, no one really turns their heads to us. By Hugo’s request, we are seated in a booth in the back corner of the dining room to give us the most privacy.

We chat lightly, then order with the waitress. The minute she walks away again, quiet falls around us.

It’s not uncomfortable, exactly. Hugo and I have developed a good rapport over the months that we’ve known each other know. Hugo values the quiet more than I do, but I’m used to the pauses with him now. Just because he’s quiet does not mean he’s uncomfortable.

With Hugo, the silence is calming somewhat, like sitting beside a steady river.

It’s not the exciting rapids that being with Miles is like, but maybe this is what a relationship is supposed to be. Quiet support. Building a foundation before pressing forward into the heavy sexual stuff.

Hugo gives me a small smile, which I return.

“I hope this isn’t awkward,” he says.

“It’s not,” I tell him. “It’s different, but it’s nice…”

If I put aside my whirlwind feelings for Miles and compare this scenario more for how my relationship went with Garnar, this situation with Hugo is something safe. He’s a good man, who treats me kindly. He has some hang ups from his past relationships, but none of those are red flags to me personally.

He is kind and sweet, and I’m quite fond of him.

If Miles wasn’t already in my heart, I would have easily fallen for Hugo. I can’t let my attachment to someone unobtainable stand in the way of my happiness now.

“Is it difficult… being here with me, when your heart is somewhere else?” Hugo asks.

I startle at first. Sometimes it’s easy to forget that he knows the true depths of my feelings for Miles. But then, it’s only because he knows and understands that I truly trust him with everything else I have left to give.

Maybe I can’t offer Hugo my whole heart, but I hoping what I have will be enough.

Maybe that isn’t fair.

“I feel like I’m being unfair to you,” I say.

Hugo shakes his head lightly. “I knew exactly what I was signing up for.” He pauses a moment to collect his thoughts. I patiently wait for him to do so. “I think… with your lingering feelings for…” He blessedly doesn’t name Miles. “And my previous hardships… Esther, how do you feel about taking this slowly?”

A flood of relief fills through me. “I’d like that,” I say.

Everything with Miles moved way too quickly. I was caught up in the moment with him, as if I was captured in a perfect storm. It was wonderful, and I enjoyed every moment of it. But maybe I should have known from the start it wasn’t going to last.

Maybe I did see the end coming, but ignored it, because being with Miles was so fun.

I’d prefer something different now. With Hugo, moving slowly sounds like the perfect speed.

Our meals come then, and we eat in companionable silence while smiling at each other. Hugo offers me a piece of his veggies, and I offer him some of my potatoes. Everything’s delicious. The meal, the ambience, the company. It all amounts to a perfectly acceptable date.

Just because it doesn’t give me butterflies doesn’t make it bad…

Hugo picks up the check, even though I argue that we chose this restaurant in part so that I could easily pick up the tab this time. But Hugo insists, credit card already ready for when the waitress comes around.

“Thank you,” I tell him.

“I’m happy to,” he says.

After the bill is paid, we pull on our coats once more and start to head to the exit. We are nearly there, when a voice calls out for Hugo.

“Hugo Harbinger! Why, I never thought I’d run into you all the way out here,” says a woman who quickly approaches us.

My stomach sinks uncomfortably down, down, down through my body. I recognize this woman. Though we’ve never really been properly introduced, I’ve seen her picture a million times. I’ve studied her minute expressions. I embarrassingly searched for her in the club after Miles kissed me, making certain she didn’t see.

Selena.

Miles’s fiancé.

Right here in the flesh.

The suburb restaurant we chose was not far enough to lead me away from this person, this situation, this hurt that immediately dragged me straight back down into the pit of despair that I’d been so desperately trying to claw my way out of.

I have to look this woman in the face now, knowing I am in the other woman in her relationship.

What a hypocrite I’ve become.

“Selena,” Hugo says cordially, while glancing at me.

Selena glances at me too. “Oh. Hello, Esther.”

I blink. Why does Selena know my name?