Chapter 22
“This is Peter Cruz.”
I watch Gemma’s eyes turn luminous as the handsome man from her past life approaches her. Earlier, I’d introduced her to two other men, and while the interactions between them were warm—this immediately feels different.
Peter has the same look in his eye, taken aback and curious, as if he’s meeting someone he’s met before. And not just because she’s famous. It runs deeper than that.
I love this part so much.
The moment when two souls who have spent centuries in different love stories recognize each other in this lifetime. I feel it deep in my chest, the rightness of it. I turn and find myself looking for Daniel.
But I don’t see him and duty calls. So, I mingle with a few more clients and make sure everything’s going well.
So far, I’ve counted three matches of just my own clients: Taylor the improv comic and Jason the baker.
Lauren the jewelry designer and Nicholas the hotelier (so obvious and easy I almost feel like I can’t take any credit for it).
Meghan the writer and Jon the finance bro.
Check, check, check.
Daniel’s talking to a petite woman with a chic blond pixie cut when I finally find him. “Sorry to interrupt”—I glance at her pin—“Daniel and Brooke. But just wanted to let you both know that some of the galleries will be opening up shortly if you’d be interested in exploring.”
“Oh, I didn’t know that was happening tonight,” Daniel says, genuinely excited. “I’d love to go view.”
Brooke glances across the way, and I see her eyeing a man with sandy hair and wire-rimmed glasses. These two were lovers during the Spanish-American War. “I think I’ll grab another drink before heading over there. So great to meet you, Daniel.”
Daniel gives her his full attention with a warm smile. “Very much the same, Brooke.”
When she leaves, I look at him with a clear question on my face. He grins. “She was nice.”
“I know what that means,” I say, hiding my relief. “Are you having a good time, then?”
“Yes, of course,” he says. “This is such a thoughtful, beautiful event.”
It’s gratifying—even if it’s because this guy is maybe trying to get into my pants. “I’m glad to hear it.”
“So, do you want to show me these galleries?” he asks, holding out his arm like a Regency-era gentleman or an undercover spy.
I take it. “Sure.” We head to BCAM, the Broad Contemporary Art Museum, within the museum—a large modern structure made up of limestone and red steel beams. The tall palms lining the path to the entrance make the walk feel dramatic.
“Ooh, they opened up BCAM for us?” Daniel asks, his pace getting quicker as he realizes where we’re headed.
“I thought this might be up your alley.” I push the doors open and we’re greeted by a security guard.
We’re the first ones here, and our footsteps make satisfying echoing clacks as we walk through in our fancy footwear.
We take the elevators, which are filled with large Barbara Kruger murals—giant advertising text in stark black, white, and red.
“These always feel like an attack,” I say with a laugh.
“An interesting choice for an entrance into the place, right?” Daniel says. “She’s yelling at us about consumerism and consumption, but in this rarified space.”
I’m struck, yet again, by how earnest Daniel is about things that, on a Tinder profile, would have me rolling my eyes: travel, food, music, art. But Daniel knows his stuff, he walks the walk.
When we step off the elevator, we run straight into Halmoni. “Cassia,” she says with a smile. She glances at Daniel, as if wondering who he is. But she knows. I see the quicksilver moment when her eyes flash in recognition.
“Halmoni, this is Daniel. Daniel, this is my grandmother, the founder of the agency.”
He seems to lose his composed veneer for about two seconds as he says, “Oh! Hello, lovely to meet you. Thank you for the invitation.”
I have to give Halmoni credit for not looking more curious. In fact, she acts almost indifferent to him. “Hello.” She looks down at her phone. Then she glances up and gives him a cursory smile. “I hope you have a good evening and meet some interesting people.” Then a look at me. “See you later?”
I nod and ignore the bead of sweat making its way down my back. With Halmoni meeting him—it all feels incredibly real suddenly.
Daniel must sense something because he raises an eyebrow. “Scary Halmoni?” His British accent speaking in Korean is delightful.
I laugh. “Yes, but also no. My grandmother has high standards for these events. Just wants everything to go smoothly.”
“Does she mind you mingling with the clients?” Teasing and aware.
“No, she wants us to get to know all of you.” It’s not a lie. “We do our jobs best when we truly know our clients.”
We walk into a gallery filled with modern art from the 1900s when Daniel says, “So, I have to address the elephant in the room.”
“What’s that?” But I have a feeling I know what he’s about to say.
“Ellis.”
I give him my full attention, keeping my features very, very neutral. “What about him?”
Daniel tilts his head as he looks at me. “He’s my employee but also a friend.”
“Mm-hmm.”
“Are you two…” He falters a bit, looking less assured of himself. “I know it’s really none of my business, but I just want to be super clear about where you two left things?”
I remember the yurt, the light glowing off of Ellis as he rushed to put on his shirt. “I ended things.”
Something indecipherable flickers across his face. “Oh, okay.”
We walk in silence through a room full of bronze cast statues by Alberto Giacometti—intricate and grotesque shapes that seem to stretch toward the ceiling.
Finally, I speak. “I just…he’s really wonderful. But the age gap was…it felt insurmountable to me.” All I can be is honest about this. I don’t care if it makes me feel like I’m aging myself, making myself less desirable.
“Ah, okay, that explains it.” Daniel has stopped, looking at a huge David Hockney painting of Mulholland Drive, his shoulders a little more relaxed now. “He seemed a bit…”
We stare at the Hockney together, with its vivid blues and imprecise grids, and I realize I am tense waiting for the rest.
“…subdued.”
My head turns to his too quickly. “Subdued?”
“Yeah. Ellis is like this glowing ball of energy, you know? He just kind of lights a place up. But the last couple weeks he’s been…subdued.”
This feels crushing to me and Daniel senses the mood has dampened. “Sorry, I’m not saying this to make you feel guilty.” I nod and he rubs his cheek in agitation. “Ah, bloody hell, I shouldn’t have said it.”
“No, no, really it’s fine,” I say. “I feel a little bad about it, but let’s be real. That kid will be fine. We went out a couple times and he is…well, the way he is.”
“Yes,” he says, and it sounds like he wants to say more but doesn’t. “Just wanted to make sure.”
“Sure,” I echo. And then we both laugh from the awkwardness of it all.
Voices reach us as more people fill into the museum. I decide to be bold while I can. “Did you want me to introduce you to more people?”
He seems to understand the other part to this question. “To be perfectly honest, I’m having a good time with you.”
Pleasure fills me and it wars with the vestiges of guilt about Ellis. “Okay.”
“Do you have other people to tend to?”
I glance at my watch. “I think I’m good for a bit.”
“Brilliant,” he says. We walk through the galleries—passing by an incredible chrome sculpture by Man Ray, a painting by Joan Mitchell that stops me in my tracks, and a walk-in installation that meticulously replicates a nostalgic garage from the 1950s.
We leave the installation with goose bumps—the empty museum adding to the time-trapped feeling.
Daniel knows so much about art that I stop reading the placards.
And he’s not lecturing me tediously—he’s sharing a genuine passion of his and it’s refreshing to be in someone’s area of expertise.
“Did you always want to do landscape architecture? Seems like you have a real interest in fine art,” I say.
He peers closely at a piece by Ellsworth Kelly before answering me. “Hm, yes and no? There’s this thing about being adopted. Sometimes, you kind of feel like you have to be the gold standard of children?”
I look at him, feeling sad. “Oh, but—”
“I know, I know. I’ve years to process this in therapy,” he says with a self-deprecating laugh.
“And really, I shouldn’t speak for all adopted children so maybe it was just a me thing.
Regardless, it was there for a long time.
My parents encouraged me to do whatever I wanted, but they were right proper, pragmatic people.
My father was an accountant and my mum was a sales rep for a food supplier.
I voluntarily squashed all love of fine art and directed my love of design into landscape architecture. ”
“Do you like your job, then?”
“Yes,” he says without hesitation. “It’s really interesting, but also feels purposeful. You’re creating work that endures beyond your own lifetime. And I love the outdoors.”
“But?”
He smiles. “There’s no ‘but.’ ”
“Okay,” I say easily. I’m noting a few things—this man is purposeful.
Goal-oriented. I think about the way his life has unfolded; he’s created all this for himself.
I admire him for it. I wonder if this is why Daniel and I are fated, and why we might be drawn to each other life after life.
I appreciate his steadiness, his clear-eyed view of what he wants.
We’re similar, and maybe that’s the trick to making relationships work: an ease, a lack of friction in desires.
I remember Ellis—going where the wind takes him.
We go downstairs to the first floor and walk out into a long corridor that is dark and cool and lit by a wall of fluorescent tubes by Robert Irwin. We’re the only ones in here.
“Do you have a ‘but’ with your line of work?” he asks, his voice quieter in the quiet space.
The lights range from cool blue to a fiery neon orange. The glow makes everything in the room warmer, more intimate. “Not really, I love my job,” I say simply. “It’s literally hope in action.”
“That’s a very poetic way to look at it.” Something about the way he says it, I wonder if despite his love of art, he’s pragmatic at heart.
“I get to believe in love as my job.”
The word “love” feels outsized and overwhelming in this space. He asks, “So, you’re planning on it for yourself? A match?” I feel his eyes on me, his unconscious sway closer.
“I am,” I say. “I know I’m forty so, like, what’s taking so long when it’s my specialty?”
“Is it a case of the cobbler’s family not having any shoes?” he teases.
“No, nothing like that,” I say. And when I look at him, his expression is completely absorbed, so fixed on mine that I feel breathless for a second. “I just know exactly who I’m looking for, too.”
When we leave the room, everything shifts into bright white, illuminating everything. We don’t say anything else as we step out into the L.A. night.