Sarah Moynihan

I see him before he sees me, sitting on a bench outside of the restaurant, waiting for me. I can’t see his face because he has his head down but I already know what he looks like. Blonde hair, brown eyes, crooked smile. I blink and I don’t see him sitting there.

In his place sat the stranger I had spoken to earlier at the park. The woman with two little girls looked up at me and smiled. “I’m Lavender.”
She stuck out her hand and I grabbed it. “Dove.”

My stomach dips with anxiety before I call out his name. He finally looks up and I wait for the feeling. The butterflies, the heart racing, the uncontrollable smile, but when he looks at me I don’t feel any of that. I feel…nothing.

“I think I’m broken,” I told Lavender after we began talking about love. We had been talking for over an hour, like old friends in a coffee shop.

She pulled her legs up, angling her body toward me, still keeping an eye on her girls. “Why?”

A blush crawled up my neck. “I don’t know if I know how to love.”

We stand there awkwardly for a moment before I reach out to hug him. Is this what I’m supposed to do? He sort of returns the hug before we both pull away and he directs me toward the restaurant. I open the door and step into the warm embrace of the waiting area.

Once we are seated he asks me questions we’ve already texted about. The conversation is easy; I laugh at all the right times. As he pays the check a couple outside the window catches my eye. I turn to look at them but when I do I see a distorted image of myself staring back at me.

“I don’t think that’s true. I think we all know how to love, even serial killers,” Lavender joked.

I laughed, but it felt more self-deprecating than anything.

“I mean you’ve been on dates, right?”

“Yes, of course.”

“And? Has there been anybody?”

I smiled but didn’t say anything. I didn’t know how to tell her that I had found plenty of men who liked me, who perhaps one day could’ve even loved me, but I’d pushed them away before they’d gotten too close. I had been alone for so long I didn’t know when it was safe to open up.
She looked at me expectantly. “No. At least I don’t think so.”

“You’ll know,” she said certainly.

With our stomachs full we step back outside into the cold to walk around. Even though Christmas is over there are still lights wrapped around the street lamps.

I feel safe surrounded by the familiarity of the town that I grew up in. We pop into random shops to warm up and despite how well we get along I can’t fight the feeling that I am forcing myself to be here.

“It will feel different,” she added.

“Like waking up from a dream,” I said more to myself than to her. When she looked at me strangely I elaborated, “I think love is like that, maybe.”

“Like a dream?”

I shook my head. “Like waking up. Everything seems great in a dream, perfect even, but when you wake up reality sets in. You want someone you can wake up and face reality with. Someone that doesn’t make you want to fall back asleep and chase the dream, but someone that makes you want to live.”

“Wow,” she breathed out.

“It’s stupid.”

“No!” Her abruptness made me jump. “It’s not. At all.” She spun the band on her finger.

I shove my hands into my pockets. He had already done the same. Do we look as awkward as I feel?

Eventually, we both tire of the cold and he walks me back to my car. I thank him for a nice time and he tells me we should do it again sometime. I absentmindedly nod my head in agreement.

“How did you meet your husband?” I asked her.

Lavender tried to fight a smile, perhaps for my sake, but it tugged at the corner of her lips. Before she could tell me the sound of a crying child drew our attention away. Her daughter sat on the wood chips sobbing.

“That’s my cue,” she said, rising to console her. “It was nice talking to you, Dove. I hope you find what you’re looking for.”

I watched as she ran over to her daughter, a man approaching her with a coffee in each hand. She smiled up at him adoringly.

I get in my car and drive away.

Sarah is currently pursuing her MFA in fiction at Salve Regina University. She has both a bachelor’s and master’s degree in English from UConn and URI, respectively. In addition to writing, she enjoys diving into fictional worlds—both books and media—and talking about them on her bookstagram or with anyone willing to listen.