Chapter 4 - Breakfast With a Deadline
Ethan called instead of texting.
Camille answered on the second ring.
“Where are you?”
Her breathing was uneven.
Not panicked.
But close.
“Brickell.”
“Where exactly?”
She gave him the name of a restaurant.
“I’m outside.”
“What happened?”
“Ethan.”
Her voice broke slightly.
“Please just come.”
He was already standing.
“I’m on my way.”
The drive took nineteen minutes.
It felt like forty.
Ethan found Camille beneath the awning of an expensive restaurant on South Miami Avenue.
She had changed clothes.
Black trousers.
A cream-colored top.
Hair down.
She looked elegant and miserable.
A light rain had begun.
“Get in.”
Camille opened the passenger door.
For the first several blocks neither spoke.
Ethan did not ask where André was.
He waited.
Eventually Camille said, “He brought someone.”
Ethan glanced at her.
“What?”
“To dinner.”
She laughed once.
It sounded terrible.
“Not a girlfriend.”
Somehow that made less sense.
“His business partner.”
Camille stared through the windshield.
“Apparently he has a presentation tomorrow morning for investors in Miami. That’s why he came.”
Ethan tightened his hands on the wheel.
“He told you he came to see you?”
“No.”
“Did you think—”
“Yes.”
The answer was immediate.
“I thought he came for me.”
Silence.
Camille continued.
“He didn’t lie. That’s the worst part.”
Ethan said nothing.
“He never said it.”
She pressed her palms together.
“I created the entire story.”
“He knew you expected him.”
“Probably.”
“That matters.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
Camille turned toward him.
“You don’t get to make him the villain because you want me available.”
The accusation stung because part of it was true.
Ethan kept his eyes on the road.
“You’re right.”
She closed her eyes.
“I shouldn’t have said that.”
“You should if you think it.”
“I don’t know what I think.”
They reached a red light.
Ethan looked at her.
“Then don’t decide tonight.”
Camille swallowed.
The light changed.
“Where do you want to go?”
“I don’t know.”
“Home?”
“No.”
“Your mother’s?”
“Absolutely not.”
Ethan almost smiled.
“Beach?”
“At eleven at night?”
“You’re the Florida expert.”
Camille looked out the window.
“Drive east.”
They ended up in South Beach.
Not the loud portion filled with clubs.
A quieter stretch where the rain had pushed most people away.
They removed their shoes and walked near the water.
For fifteen minutes Camille said nothing.
Then she began telling Ethan the story she had apparently never told anyone in one uninterrupted piece.
She met André when she was nineteen.
He was twenty-one.
Architecture student.
Charming without trying.
Restless.
Brilliant.
He sketched buildings on restaurant napkins.
He could walk into a room of strangers and leave with five friends.
Camille had loved him almost immediately.
For six years they built the kind of relationship everyone around them assumed would become marriage.
Then Camille’s mother was diagnosed with breast cancer.
At nearly the same time, André received an opportunity in New York.
“He asked me to go.”
“You couldn’t.”
“I wouldn’t.”
Camille looked toward the ocean.
“Mom had surgery. Chemo. Max was still in college. My father had been gone since I was fourteen. I wasn’t leaving.”
“André went.”
“Yes.”
“At first he flew back every other weekend.”
She smiled sadly.
“He tried.”
Ethan heard the fairness in her voice.
She still protected him.
“Then every other weekend became once a month.”
She drew her arms around herself.
“Then there was a project in Toronto. Then another in London.”
“You broke up.”
“We said we did.”
The waves reached their feet.
Neither moved.
“But whenever he came home, everything restarted.”
“Did he ever ask you to marry him?”
“Once.”
Ethan stopped walking.
Camille continued several steps before noticing.
She turned.
“When?”
“Three years ago.”
“What happened?”
“I said yes.”
That was not what Ethan expected.
He stared.
Camille gave him a tired smile.
“Surprise.”
“You were engaged?”
“For eleven days.”
“What happened on day twelve?”
“André received an offer to lead a project in Singapore.”
The rain had stopped, but droplets still clung to Camille’s hair.
“He asked me to move.”
“You said no.”
“I asked if we could choose a city together for once.”
Ethan understood before she finished.
“He went.”
“Yes.”
“And the engagement?”
“We never announced it.”
Camille looked embarrassed.
“I gave the ring back at the airport.”
Ethan felt anger then.
Not because André chose a career.
Because Camille was standing on a beach three years later still questioning whether wanting to be chosen had been unreasonable.
“What happened tonight?”
Camille looked down.
“André said he misses me.”
Ethan waited.
“He said he still thinks about us.”
“And?”
“He’s been offered a project in Dubai.”
Ethan almost laughed.
Not because it was funny.
Because it was brutally predictable.
“He leaves next month.”
“For eighteen months.”
“Did he ask you to go?”
Camille nodded.
“And what did you say?”
“Nothing.”
There it was.
The real reason she called Ethan.
Not because André had disappointed her.
Because he had reopened the door.
Again.
“What do you want?” Ethan asked.
Camille rubbed her forehead.
“Why does everyone keep asking me that?”
“Because it’s your life.”
“I don’t know.”
“That’s allowed.”
“No, it isn’t.”
Her voice sharpened.
“I’m thirty-two. I should know.”
Ethan shook his head.
“You’re allowed to be uncertain.”
Camille stared at him.
“You changed a flight for a woman you barely knew.”
“Exactly.”
“That is not helping your credibility.”
He smiled.
She almost did too.
They sat on the sand.
The city glowed behind them.
At 12:34, Camille asked a question Ethan had not expected.
“Why aren’t you married?”
He looked at her.
“That transition needs work.”
“I’m serious.”
“So am I.”
She waited.
Ethan picked up a handful of sand, then let it fall through his fingers.
“I was almost engaged.”
Camille’s expression changed.
“Her name was Rebecca.”
“What happened?”
“She wanted to move to Boston.”
Camille stared at him.
Then laughed in disbelief.
“No.”
“Yes.”
“Oh my God.”
“It’s not the same.”
“It sounds extremely similar.”
“It isn’t.”
“How?”
Ethan opened his mouth.
Closed it.
Rebecca had received a position at a hospital in Boston.
She asked him to come.
He had just received a promotion.
His father had died the previous year.
His mother was still grieving.
Seattle felt stable.
So he stayed.
Rebecca moved.
They tried long distance for eight months.
Then stopped.
Camille watched him carefully.
“You were André.”
“No.”
“A little.”
“I didn’t keep coming back and asking Rebecca to wait.”
“No.”
Camille softened.
“You just chose the life that was already built.”
That hurt more.
Because it was accurate.
At 1:20, Ethan drove Camille home.
At the curb outside her apartment, she remained seated.
“Thank you.”
“For what?”
“Not telling me what to do.”
“I’m not qualified.”
She smiled faintly.
Her phone lit up.
André.
Camille looked at it.
Then declined the call.
Ethan felt no victory.
Only sadness.
“Breakfast tomorrow?” she asked.
“Are you asking me or hiding from him?”
Camille looked at him sharply.
Ethan continued.
“I’m serious.”
She thought for several seconds.
Then said, “Both.”
“At least you’re honest.”
“Is that a yes?”
“What time?”
“Nine.”
“Where?”
“I’ll text you.”
Camille opened the door.
Before stepping out, she turned.
“Ethan?”
“Yeah?”
“Why did you really change your flight?”
He looked at her.
He could have protected himself.
Instead:
“Because when I was dancing with you, I realized I couldn’t remember the last time I stopped thinking about what came next.”
Camille’s eyes glistened.
Ethan continued.
“I wanted one more day of that.”
She stared at him.
Then got out without speaking.
The following morning, Ethan arrived at a small Little Havana café at exactly nine.
Camille was already there.
So was André Laurent.
May you like
And the empty chair beside them was clearly waiting for Ethan.
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