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Just moving through the village in an aimless way I don’t think Everett has done in years. Maybe ever.

He's not good at it at first.

I can tell.

His stride keeps wanting to quicken, to find efficiency, to arrive somewhere. Twice I catch him checking his pocket for his phone but then pushes it back into his pocket. He told me he was taking the day off and I can see how hard that is for him.

By the time we've climbed two more streets and found a tiny square with a fountain and a café with three outdoor tables, something in him has loosened.

He pulls out a chair for me.

I order us coffees in French from the elderly man behind the counter, and when I come back Everett is leaned back in his chair with his face tipped toward the sun, eyes closed, looking more comfortable than I've ever seen him.

"You look like a tourist," I tell him.

He opens one eye. "I am a tourist."

"You look like a tourist who doesn't own multiple companies."

"At the moment, I don't want to."

That comment brings a smile to my cheeks.

I set his coffee down and sit across from him, tucking one leg under me. The square is quiet. An orange cat slinks along the fountain edge. Two old men play cards at the table behind us, arguing in French about the rules of the game that I'm sure they've played for years.

I imagine if Everett and I came back next year, we'd find them here again, arguing over the same rules. Then my heart tugs with a sort of sadness at the thought that there won't be a next year for Everett and I. We'll be "happily" divorced by then. Though I'm looking forward to that less and less.

I change the course of my thoughts and try to get back on the subject in front of me. This is the life my mother had before Seattle.

Before my father and peaches and America.

This beauty. This ease.

I understand why she missed it.

After coffee, we keep walking.

It's the crêpe stand that undoes Everett's dignity first.

The stall is tiny—just a woman with a griddle and a stack of toppings—and the crêpes are huge, dusted in a truly offensive amount of powdered sugar. I order two. Hand him one.

He looks at it like I've handed him a live animal.

"It's a crêpe," I say. "Not a court summons"

"There's no way to eat this cleanly."

"There isn't. That's the point."

He grips a hold of it, folding it in half like a pizza and takes a bite.

Powdered sugar immediately coats his chin... his shirt, but I'm oddly impressed with his skill nonetheless.

He looks down at himself and realizes that he's covered in sugar and then looks up at me like I knew this would happen and set him up.

I press my lips together so hard to keep from laughing that my jaw aches.

"Don't," he says.