- Sebastian -
After three years on Wall Street, I was living the dream—at least by most people’s standards.
There were only two commandments at my firm: make money, and make the money you make make money. Other than that, there were no rules, which was strangely liberating for a guy like me.
After all, my parents raised me to believe that rules were everything, that the law was everything, regardless of whether it was religious or political. They were good Christians and even better Americans, a privilege they took very seriously after growing up in neighborhoods in Mexico that were so poor and dangerous they’d never even gone back to visit.
Yet, despite the fact that my mother was a former librarian and my father was a retired chief of police, I sometimes doubted whether either of them had read about or experienced the kind of corruption I saw on a daily basis.
Maybe that was naïve. My dad worked a lot of cases he wouldn’t talk about. But he wouldn’t talk about a lot of things, including the fact that he was convinced my colleagues were nothing but a bunch of white collar cowboys.
That being said, he was proud of the fact that I made lots of money for myself and others, since that was the one American ideal he never quite lived up to. Still, he was my ultimate hero and making him proud was everything.
Granted, I wasn’t sure he would’ve been terribly impressed to find me drinking fifteen-dollar gin cocktails on a Friday afternoon, but it was part of the job. Not my favorite part by any stretch. Most of the time, I hated the schmoozing I had to do. But I put up with it because I liked the challenge of watching market trends and trying to predict what individual stocks would do, what people would do, what money would do.
And I was good at it.
Maybe it wasn’t as noble as following in my dad’s footsteps, but one could argue that there was nothing noble about making your wife worry her days away for thirty-five years without ever earning enough to buy her a fur coat or some fine jewelry to thank her for sticking by you. Or take her to Paris. Or Spain. Or even just somewhere she could enjoy a fifteen-dollar cocktail.
Not that I had a wife.
I wasn’t sure I wanted one, either. Every guy I worked with had a wife and at least one mistress. It was like the freaking mafia. I had a theory, though, that it only worked out that way because they’d all picked the wrong wife. Surely, if you picked the right woman, she would be enough.
But picking women wasn’t like picking stocks. You couldn’t just pick one and hope for the best. The stakes were much higher.
Frankly, I was starting to think that the right woman was never going to materialize. I was convinced she did once, but she disappeared from my life overnight without a trace, without even extending the courtesy of a fucking text message.
And so much time had passed since I last saw her that her memory had taken on the surreal quality of a mirage or a hologram. Sometimes I wondered whether she’d even existed at all.
But then I’d walk by a bouquet of lilies and my whole body would tense up at the scent, reminding me that she’d been real. That I hadn’t just known her, I’d loved her.
“I can’t believe he’s going to marry her,” Dave said, getting the waiter’s attention with a raised hand and pointing at our drinks. “He’s not doing well enough to afford a girl like that.”
I liked Dave, but he had a very transactional view of relationships. Not that I could blame him. The women who frequented our social circles often had expensive taste and dollar signs in their eyes. “He loves her, Dave. What’s he supposed to do?”
“Love someone else?” he suggested, pouring some olive oil on the small plate next to our fragrant bread basket. “Someone with less expensive upkeep? Mark my words, she’ll burn through his profits, and he’ll have nothing but silicone and hair extensions to show for it.”
“You’re a terrible cynic, you know that?” I took a piece of bread and tore a corner off. “Did it ever occur to you that he might know exactly what he’s signing up for and that he might be cool with it?”
He dropped his chin. “Don’t be naïve, Sebastian. No guy ever knows what he’s signing up for.”
“You’re just jealous because she had no interest in you from the minute she started hanging out with us.”
“I reject that theory.”
“Like she rejected you.”
“I wouldn’t touch her now with a twenty-foot pole.”
“’Cause you’ve only got a two-inch one.”
He glared at me and then burst out laughing. “Her loss. I’m a freaking catch and a half.”
“Of course you are,” I said as the waiter arrived with our fresh drinks.
“And it’s more than two inches,” he said once we were alone again. “Just so you know.”
“I didn’t ask, but if anyone else does, I’ll be sure to set them straight.”
“Do,” he said, lifting his new drink to his lips without draining the dregs of his last one.
My eyes scanned the busy restaurant, lingering on people who looked familiar for their equally lush Friday lunch habits, before settling on a bouquet of white lilies in a vase across the room.
“I always get the steak, but maybe I’ll try a different cut this time,” Dave said, mostly to the menu.
I studied the flowers, which were so white they were almost glowing, until a waiter came by, picked up the vase, and walked away with it, allowing the woman seated beyond it to come into view.
My whole body stilled with shock.
Lily.
She was unmistakable. Sure, I thought I glimpsed her all the time, especially following her disappearance mere days after her eighteenth birthday. But those sightings had been nothing more than the figments of a hopeful imagination.
I loosened my tie so I could breathe better and forced myself to break my gaze so she wouldn’t catch me watching her. I didn’t even make it a whole second before my eyes were on her again.
She appeared to be with an older man, or at least a man whose hair had a distinguished smattering of gray running through it, and she smiled easily while they spoke, making my heart clench in my chest.
Had she been smiling all these years without me?
The vase was replaced a moment later with a fresh fern, and she disappeared from view.
“Excuse me,” I said, laying my napkin down in the middle of Dave’s rambling before making my way to a place at the bar where I could see her again.
She was as pretty as the first time I saw her. Only this time, her hair was longer, and she was wearing deep burgundy lipstick that made the sparkle in her eyes seem even brighter.
I don’t know how long I stood there juggling my desire to not get caught staring with my determination to not lose sight of her again, but when the man finally got up and went to the bathroom, I walked straight over to her table.
When she saw me, her eyes grew wide and her plump lips fell apart, but I couldn’t even force a smile. I was too frustrated that a single glimpse of her was all it took to stir up the warm feelings I’d tried so hard to forget, the feelings she’d so coldly turned her back on.
“Lily.”
Her chest dropped as she exhaled. “Sebastian.”
“Shouldn’t you be having lunch with me?”
Her dark lashes looked heavy but didn’t fall shut.
“Seeing as how we never broke up.”
It felt like she wanted to look away, but she didn’t. Of course, where she would’ve looked, I couldn’t say. Everything around us faded away the moment we made eye contact.
“I apologize for the interruption as you’re with someone, but—”
“He’s just a friend.”
My chest loosened slightly. “I just had to say hello when I saw you.”
Her dark eyes smiled.
“You look…” I took in her face and her hair and her slim shoulders and imagined what it would be like to hold her again, to breathe her in.
“So do you,” she said.
“Can I call you?”
She hesitated for an eternity before nodding.
“What’s your number?”
Her gaze dropped to my hands before rising again. “Do you need a pen?”
I shook my head.
“Eight-three-five-double four-double four.”
“Area code?”
“Nine-one-seven.”
“You live in the city?”
“Yeah.” A flush spread across her cheeks. “Are you sure you don’t need to write that down?”
I would if it were anyone else. “I’m sure.”
She swallowed.
“Promise me that’s your number,” I said, fixing my eyes on hers and wondering if it was foolish to trust her after what she put me through.
“It is.”
“Promise you’ll answer when I call.”
“I will.”
I raised my eyebrows.
“I promise.”
“Great. ’Cause I’ve been trying to reach you for five years.”
A sadness passed across her eyes. “I’m sorry.”
I wanted to touch her, hug her, and pull her to me, but she seemed as startled as I was, and I didn’t want to risk scaring her away. Especially when I had no idea what scared her off before. “Prove it by picking up the phone.”