Page 32 of Exit Lane

My smile falls, and he kisses my forehead, then my brow.

“But I’m not moving to Iowa either. It turns out, against all odds, and maybe even against my will, I am a New Yorker. Or at least I am for now.” He runs a hand through his hair, coppery in the sun. “That thing you wrote in your notebook about Sloane and Cart’s wedding, about connecting the different parts of yourself... you changed me too. In order to make it through the last few years, I had to orient myself toward the future—fearlessly—and I learned that from you.”

I hold his wool lapels and kiss the tiredness under his eyes. I look up at him. “So no Fifty-First Street, then?”

He laughs. “Not anytime soon.”

“Would you accept, at the very least, me moving back to this continent? To be with you?”

He’s silent for a beat.

“I would love that.” He tucks my hair behind my ear and leans into me so our foreheads are touching and our eyes are locked. “I want you to do that.”

When he pulls away, I can see our breath in the cold. He turns back to the wheel and starts the engine, then rests his hand on my thigh. “Ready?” he asks, and I nod.

I lean toward him to put my head against his shoulder, and we pull onto the highway. I check my map. “Fifty miles from where it all started.”

“Yes,” he says with a smirk. “Fifty miles and eight years.”