CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR What Maya Wanted to Say
For several weeks, Maya kept thinking of sentences she wanted to tell Andre.I am sorry I learned too late.I remember how you took your coffee.I found the restaurant where we had our first date; it's a furniture store now.You were right about the gray floors.
They already look dated.The sentences came while she drove, showered, worked, waited in line.Maya began writing them in the notes app on her phone instead of sending them.Soon the note became pages long.Not a love letter.A museum of unsent things.One evening, she reread it.Some entries were heartbreaking.Some were ridiculous.Andre would have hated the new chairs in my office.Andre would know how to fix the hinge on this cabinet.Andre would tell me to stop buying plants until I learn the names of the ones I have.Maya laughed.Then she saw an entry from the day after the park.I wish his children had been mine.She stared at it for a long time.Then changed the sentence.I wish I had made different choices when a different life was possible.That was truer.His children were not hers to wish away from Simone.His marriage was not a theft from Maya.The distinction felt important.Maya deleted the entire note.For a moment she panicked as the screen went blank.Then she breathed.Nothing true had been erased.The truth just no longer needed to be rehearsed.