Page 8 of Seven Minutes
Graduation. Heat pressed through the stiff fabric of mygown, sticking it to the back of my neck. The air smelled like carnations and cheap perfume. My mom’s eyes found me in the crowd, shining so bright I could’ve sworn they reflected the whole world. When she finally reached me, she threw her arms around me and squeezed until my lungs protested, but it hurt in the best possible way—the kind that saysyou made it.
I could feel her breath against my ear when she whispered, “I’m so proud of you.”
And something inside me burst open, a mixture of relief and disbelief flooding through me. I thought maybe I could be okay. That I might actually make it through to something bright. Something worth holding onto. The chokehold my teenage angst and gay panic had on me over the last few years dissolved somewhat.
The images continued to spin, the edges of the memory glowing too warm and golden to be real.
The distinct smell of leather and gasoline filled my lungs, sharp and new. My hands gripped the steering wheel of a car. It was dented and used, with worn upholstery and a sagging roof liner, but it was mine. The keys had jingled in my pocket like a promise all day, and now here I was, windows rolled down, radio turned up loud, and the road stretching out in front of me like it had been waiting just for me.
The first turn was precarious, my foot too heavy on the gas, but the thrill drowned out the fear. Wind whipped through my hair and stung my face, carrying the taste of possibility, of a life finally in my control. The world didn’t feel like a cage. It felt wide open. Boundless.
And then the picture turned to static, a harsh flash bleedinginto something softer. The antiseptic sting of the ER peeled back, replaced by the rich, bitter scent of coffee. I knew this place. I knew this day.
I was twenty again, standing in line at the campus café, trying to look casual while my hands vibrated from too much caffeine and not enough sleep. My stomach churned with nervous energy, every nerve on edge. I didn’t notice him at first. Not until the barista slid my latte across the counter and my elbow clipped it. The cup tipped, splashing a white wave across the lid and onto him.
“Shit—sorry—” I fumbled for napkins, heat scorching my cheeks, tongue sticking against the roof of my mouth.
He looked up, and God, that look! Those sharp eyes pinned me in place. His laugh was soft and startled as he shook drops of cream off his sleeve. His dark hair fell into his eyes, glasses sliding down the bridge of his nose, and a textbook tucked under his arm that I wanted to carry for him.
“It’s fine.” His rich, low voice struck somewhere deep in my chest, vibrating against my heart. “Better than getting burned by hot coffee. You, uh… always this smooth?”
I should have wanted the floor to swallow me, but instead I laughed too, and the sound lit something up inside me. Something I hadn’t realized I’d been missing until that moment. My breath caught sharp and wrong, like something inside me had been bent double and forced straight again.
The world had felt muted until his laugh cracked it open. Bright, unguarded, and sliding into me like sunlight through a window I hadn’t known was closed. My stomach flipped. Myhands twitched in restless anticipation, almost reaching for him before I realized how exposed I felt.
My body wasn’t built to hold a sound that alive.
One drink turned into three, and then a croissant we didn’t need but ordered anyway, just to stretch the minutes. I remember the way he broke the pastry in half, sugar dusted across his fingers and the table, and I could feel my pulse hammering in my ears like a drum. Absurdly, I wanted to be the thing he held so carefully, every shard of attention he gave, every subtle gesture.
“So, uh,” I said, voice shaking despite my effort to be casual, “is this where I’m supposed to ask for your number, or do I just keep showing up here at the same time every day until fate gets bored with me?”
He smirked—God, that smirk, wicked, charming—and slid his phone across the table. “Bold of you to assume fate has the attention span for that.”
I fumbled, nearly dropped the phone, and he laughed again. That same laugh that had rewired something inside me. My hands shook as I typed my name and number, each press of a key engraving a promise into the air between us. Permanent. Irrevocable.
Every detail seared itself into me. The bitter bite of espresso that clung to my tongue. The scrape of chair legs against tile when he leaned in closer. The faint, woodsy scent of his cologne, clean and sharp, was the start of something dangerous. His glasses slipped down his nose, and he pushed them up with the back of his hand, casual, thoughtless, making mypulse stutter hard, as if my heart was telling me:this is it.This is the moment everything changes.
It was all so clear. The smell of the café. The buttery taste of the croissant. The way my stomach swooped when he smiled, the air between us charged with something that felt both brand new and entirely inevitable. My fingers itched to reach across the table, to touch him, to claim even a fraction of that warmth.
That was it—the first flicker. The moment the reel began to spool.
And somehow, I was already building a life around him before either of us knew it. I could see my name next to his on a marriage certificate, the wax seal on our wedding invitations pressed with his initials, his handwriting scrawled across grocery lists and sticky notes, his jacket hanging beside mine on the hook by the door. All the quiet proofs of forever taking shape around a single laugh in a corner café.
And lying there now—heart stopped, body broken—I understood: this memory wasn’t just a beginning. It was a promise. Everything that mattered, everything that followed, began with that laugh, that glance, that impossible, ridiculous accident with a cup of coffee.
Adrian.
Always Adrian.
Chapter 4
The Second Minute
ELI
The reel lurched, shuddered, and then steadied. The snapshots of childhood, all those quick blinks of becoming, melted into something sharper, slower, as if the projector wanted me to linger here.
Our first date.
