Page 78 of Library or Lattes?

“I saw you earlier. Outside the shop …” James said gently.

“I … it wasn’t me,” I replied. Quickly. “I’ve been sick. So sick, all day.” I coughed again for effect.

“Was it April? The reason you left?”

I coughed, louder this time. “No. I’m sick. I told you …”

The name hung in the air between us. That meant it was real. She was real. And that meant I’d seen exactly what I thought I’d seen.

If I admitted I’d seen them, I’d have to admit I cared. Then he’d know how much it hurt.

Silence, except for the fire crackling beside us.

“Maybe,” I admitted eventually.

“Can I explain?” And when I turned to look at him, his eyes were wide, and pleading with mine.

I shrugged.

“So that was April. My ex-girlfriend. Actually, my ex-fiancée. We got together really young. I went to Oak High and she went to Madison, this girls’ school in Indiana.”

I nodded, hoping I looked calm. The word ex was whirring around my mind. Ex. I clung to it. But the word fiancée did something else to me. It twisted my stomach. Because fiancée meant serious. It meant a whole future, as well as a whole past … ex. James continued.

“We worked at the same summer camp between junior and sophomore year. That’s where we met.”

I shook my head.

“When we got together it was great. First love. We saw each other every holiday, and we really thought we were going to be together forever. She made me promise I would move to Indiana after I finished school. So I did.” James’s eyes were sad. I didn’t say anything, didn’t move, just let him continue.

“I mean, it was my choice. I thought I was in love. Even though my mom and dad begged me to take some time, do some more visits, that sort of thing, I was really stubborn then. And kind of grumpy.”

“You, grumpy? I can’t even imagine …” I allowed myself to smile. For the first time there was a little more air in the room.

“But anyway, to make a long story short, I spent a few miserable years working in Indiana, in a job I hated, engaged to a girl who took selfies constantly. Turned out she cared more about likes than she did about me.”

I balanced my chin on my knees. “I’m sure that’s not true …”

James laughed. “Oh, it is. Remember you asked why I stopped my photography? It was the constant Insta pics. Anyway, I haven’t even gotten to the best part yet … a few months ago, I found out she’d been cheating on me. For at least a year.”

“Oh, James,” I said. My heart ached for him.

He ran his hand through his hair. “Yeah … That was tough. And I found out—of course—from Instagram. I hate that stupid app. Some guy tagged her in a post in Pennsylvania when she said she was in Boston for work.”

“Pennsylvania …” I said, it suddenly clicking.

“Penn State …” James filled in the blank. “Yeah, that didn’t help with that Carter kid. But it was the way he looked at you, the way he talked to you, and not just that goddamn Penn State sweatshirt.”

He pulled off his hat, and his dark hair flopped around his face, softening the tense expression.

“You know there was nothing between us …” I said, conscious that I’d moved closer to James. Now I could feel the heat of his leg against my bare one.

“I know. But, Red, there could have been and it would have been none of my business.”

I reached for his hand, and he covered mine, as if to keep it from the cold. Now it all made sense.

She cheated on him. April was the bad guy here, not James. All his walls, his hot-and-cold behavior, it all fit together now. He’d just been trying to protect himself from getting hurt.

And I’d made it worse, talking about Carter, mentioning Rome, poking at wounds I didn’t even know existed.