Page 24 of Cackle

Sophie sighs. “I don’t like to share anyone’s secrets, but I will say this. He’s a very complicated, haunted man.”

I follow Sophie up the steps to the gazebo. There are two girls already inside sitting on the ground instead of on the built-in bench. They’re close to each other. They might be playing one of those hand-slapping games, or trading secrets, or practicing kissing.

When they see Sophie, they shoot up.

“Hello, Miss Sophie,” they say in unison.

“Hello, girls,” Sophie says. She pats each of them on the head. When she does this, the girls eye each other. I watch color flood their cheeks.

“We were just leaving,” one of them says. “Bye!”

“Bye, now,” Sophie says, waving.

The way people react to her . . . is there something I’m missing? Or is she just so beautiful that people don’t know what to do with themselves when they’re around her?

She sits on the bench and I park myself next to her. She sets her coffee down, removes the sleeve and wraps her hands around the naked cup.

“Did you use to date? Oskar, I mean,” I say. I regret it immediately. I don’t know what to do with myself around her. How to act. “I thought there was a vibe.”

“Me and Oskar? Oh, no,” she says, laughing. “No, no. I don’t bother with men in that way. Or women. Or anyone. I haven’t for a long, long time. I’ve discovered, over the years, that I’m much happier alone.”

The words land square in the center of my forehead. Much. Happier. Alone.

“Are you all right, Annie?”

“Yeah, sorry,” I say. “I just . . . My boyfriend, well, ex-boyfriend . . . We just . . . I’m just going through a recent breakup. We were together for almost ten years. We lived together. I thought we were going to get married. So it’s a big . . . It’s an adjustment.”

I try to retract the tears into my eyes by sheer force of will. I feel one escape.

“Oh, Annie,” she says. She reaches for my hand and squeezes it.

“It’s okay,” I say. “It’s just hard.”

“I’m sure,” she says.

“We’re on good terms, which helps. It wasn’t contentious. Sometimes things don’t work out.”

“Mm,” she says, sipping her coffee. She gazes out into space, thinking something. Then she says, “I’m inclined to hate him.”

“Oh, no,” I say. “No, he really didn’t do anything wrong. We think we’re probably just better as friends.”

“This all seems quite diplomatic,” she says. “What you’re saying. Your words. But your face.”

She cradles my face, chin to cheek, in her warm palm.

“Your face, your eyes, they tell me another story,” she says, gently removing her hand. “But you can tell me that one another time. Or not at all. It’s your story to tell or never to tell.”

I shrug. “I’m not sure there is much of a story.”

She nods, but it’s a skeptical nod. She doesn’t believe me. And she shouldn’t. There is a story. Of course there is. It’s just a bad one. I thought I was settled in a stable, long-term relationship, which led to a complacency on my end that slowly eroded the romance. It’s sad and painful and, maybe worst of all, boring. I wouldn’t make her sit through it. I can barely stand it myself.

“You may not believe me,” she says, lowering her voice to a whisper, “but I am older than I look. And the thing about age is, it gifts you with incredible wisdom. So you must trust me, and all my incredible wisdom, when I tell you that, though you’re hurting now and it surely feels like it’s a permanent state, like a fog that will never lift, I promise you it will.”

I take a deep breath. “Yeah.”

“But,” she says, pausing to take a sip of her coffee, “you’ll discover for yourself soon enough the things that devastate us most in the moment are always the things we look back on with such gratitude.”

I wish I could believe her. I want to, but I can’t let go of my cynicism. I have to keep it close, tucked under my seat like an inflatable life vest. I’m too afraid of what will happen if I allow myself to become hopeful. What terrible disappointments will attack while I’m stupid happy and unprepared.