Chapter 1
The first time I saw Lawrence, he was yelling at a parking ticket machine. Not just a frustrated sigh or a muttered curse, but a full-throated, arm-waving monologue worthy of a Shakespearean tragedy. It was the kind of performance that would have sent any sane person running for cover, but I found myself frozen in place, captivated. He was an Adonis in an expensive suit, gesturing wildly with a ticket that fluttered like a white dove clutched between his fingers. When he finally noticed me, his whole demeanor changed in a single, practiced second. The storm cloud vanished, replaced by a devastating smile that said, "All is well now that you're here." And just like that, I was hooked.
We've been dating for seven months now. And now, we're celebrating my latest promotion—a title bump that feels less like a reward and more like an admission that I'm just as much a glutton for punishment as he is. This restaurant is designed to make you feel both important and utterly insignificant. Lawrence will order a drink with a name that sounds like a forest fire, I’ll get a wine that won’t make the sommelier sneer. We'll talk about work, about the insufferable clients and the late nights, but every word will carry a second, hidden meaning. He'll pretend to be a mystery, and I'll pretend to solve him.
The maître d’ glances at our shoes before our faces, a tic reserved for those who think table assignments are a commentary on net worth. And Lawrence just lets him. It's a kind of quiet grace, a refusal to engage in petty competition, that makes my heart swell. He follows the man past the nervous power couples and the perfect-teeth influencer clones, all the way to a shadowed corner behind a ficus.
Lawrence pulls out my chair with a flourish that's almost a joke, but his smile is pure sincerity. This is the part of him that I love most: the effortless blend of light and shadow. The tailored navy suit, the open-throated shirt, the faint citrus bite of his aftershave, it feels intentional.
“You look incredible tonight, Veronica,” he says, and the way he says the word “tonight” makes my cheeks warm with a kind of deep affection I can no longer fight.
“So do you,” I manage to reply as I slip into the chair. My black dress requires a physics degree to keep the neckline from gaping. But when I catch his gaze drifting, I don’t feel self-conscious. Instead, I meet his eyes and see only admiration. He grins, and the whole world narrows to just this moment.
I order the cabernet, the one with a price tag that will sting less than the sommelier’s brow arch. Lawrence requests a Balvenie, neat, and makes a joke about Scotch tasting like forest fire and regret, which the server finds hilarious. He has a way of charming everyone.
He waits until the server is gone before leaning in. “I’m sorry about earlier. That thing with the parking garage. I swear the universe is conspiring to make me late every time I see you.”
“As long as the universe is doing it for me,” I say, tilting my glass in a lazy salute, “I can’t be mad.”
He laughs—short, sincere—and starts on the bread, tearing off exactly half, a simple, considerate gesture that makes me smile. On anyone else, it might feel calculated, but on Lawrence, it's just another part of his infinite charm. On anyone else, it might feel calculated, but on Lawrence, it's just another part of his infinite charm. I watch him, and in this moment, nothing else exists. The restaurant is humid with anticipation, but I have nothing to be nervous about. Every other table is just a still life, and our story has already begun.
The restaurant is humid with anticipation, but I have nothing to be nervous about. Every other table is just a still life, and our story has already begun.
The restaurant is humid with anticipation. Every table has variants of nervous fingers tracing condensation on glasses, or couples either leaning together or pushing each other away with each bite. I try not to stare, but I like to catalogue those around me.
Lawrence is narrating his day, hands sketching parabolas in the air. “We launched a new campaign for a sleep app—‘Bedder’ with two D’s, if you can believe that—and the client wanted an activation in Times Square. Only catch, they needed the billboard designed and approved in forty-eight hours. So of course, everyone’s pinging me at all hours. Because apparently I’m the only guy who can spell-check and handle contracts at the same time.”
He’s not bragging. Or rather, he’s bragging in a way that reads as passive-aggressive, but I know he means neither. I trace the stem of my wine glass, thinking about the way his hazel eyes crinkle at the corners when he smiles, as if every emotion is filtered through a private lens before it’s safe for public consumption.
“You’re insatiable about your work,” I say, and sip. The wine is sharp, with a finish that claws at the back of my throat. I like it.
“I could say the same for you,” he counters. “You work harder than anyone I know. I watched your presentation to the board, by the way. You had them eating out of your hand before the first slide was finished.”
I can’t help it—I preen a little. “They’re easy. You just have to make them think the idea was theirs in the first place.”
He laughs again, and this time his fingers drum a little pattern on the table. I wonder if he’s even aware of it, the rhythm he falls into when he’s trying to impress someone. A marketing executive’s tic, or maybe just a Lawrence thing.
“So,” I say, “how’s the ‘Bedder’ app supposed to work? Does it whisper sweet nothings until you’re out cold?”
He leans forward, elbows on the table, lowering his voice to a secret-sharing register. “It monitors your breathing, your heart rate, even your skin temperature. Uses an algorithm to optimize your sleep cycles. But the real selling point is the voice—the app has a ‘sleep whisperer,’ and she’s got this absurdly calming British accent. They paid her more than the rest of the development team combined.”
I smirk. “Silicon Valley logic. Solve all of humanity’s problems with soothing ASMR and subscription fees.” I'm a product marketer for a large tech company, while Lawerence is a product manager.
His eyes light up. “Exactly! You get it. Nobody else in the office could see why that matters, but you—”
A commotion at the next table interrupts us as a small dog in a designer bag yaps at a passing server. Lawrence blinks, then refocuses on me. It’s a small thing, but I file it away. The way his attention can shift and then, just as quickly, lock back in. He’s good at being present, but sometimes I catch him floating a little above the moment, calculating angles.
Our entrées arrive in synchronicity. Mine is seared scallops on a bed of microgreens, dusted with something gold and edible. His is a steak, medium-rare, already bleeding into the plate like a murder scene. He slides his knife through it.
“Tell me something real,” I say, surprising myself. “Not a pitch. Not a punchline.”
He considers, chewing slowly, then dabs at the corner of his mouth with the napkin. “Okay. I don’t sleep well. Never have. My parents used to joke that I was part owl. I’ve tried everything—sleep hygiene, ASMR, counting backwards in French. Nothing sticks. I still wake up in the middle of the night and go online, just to see if the world’s still turning.”
This is not what I expected. For a second, I don’t know how to respond.
I swallow, put my fork down. “Me too,” I say, quieter than I mean to. “Except I read conspiracy theories and obsess over what I said in the sixth grade. Did you know there’s an entire subreddit dedicated to people who remember every mistake they’ve ever made?”
He grins, but there’s sympathy in it. “Is that where you spend your insomnia hours?”
“Sometimes. Lately, I just listen to podcasts and let them wash over me. It’s better than silence.”
He nods. “Yeah. The silence gets heavy.”
The conversation dips for a moment. I’m aware, suddenly, of how close we’re sitting, how the flickering candle between us throws shadows up the bridge of his nose. I can smell his cologne, sharp but sweet, like the citrus you only get in winter.
“So what keeps you up?” he asks, gentle.
I want to say everything. Instead, I shrug. “Deadlines. Disappointing people. The usual.”
He tips his glass in my direction. “I promise, you’re not disappointing anyone tonight.”
Once we toast, he tells a story about a campaign that went viral for the wrong reasons. The campaign was for a luxury coffee brand, and the headline was supposed to read, "Savor the Flavor." But Lawrence's team accidentally wrote, "Savor the Flawor." It went viral instantly, with people making memes about what a "flawor" might taste like—everything from disappointment to "the faint aftertaste of your own failures." The brand had to pull the campaign and rebrand completely.
The server clears our plates and asks about dessert. Lawrence glances at me, then orders the chocolate torte for sharing, like we’ve already made that decision together.
When the server leaves, he leans back, lacing his fingers behind his head. “You’re a mystery, Veronica Caldwell.”
“Oh, please.” I roll my eyes. “I’m the most predictable person in this restaurant.”
He shakes his head. “No, you just know how to camouflage. That’s different.”
“Is that a compliment?”
His phone buzzes on the table, just once. He ignores it, but I notice the flicker of annoyance in his jaw. I wonder who it is—coworker, client, someone he’s trying not to think about? I file it away, with everything else.
Rather than address his phone, He leans across the table to drop his voice a register. “No. It's an observation. But yeah, also a compliment.”
This would be a line, except Lawrence delivers it with a sincerity that feels more dangerous than any calculated charm. For a second, I’m disarmed.
Then, as if on cue, his phone vibrates on the table a second time.
He frowns, offers a quick, “Sorry,” and silences it with a tap, face down. I watch the way his jaw sets, the faint wrinkle between his brows. He’s trying not to be distracted, but the effort only makes it more obvious.
“So. Tell me the truth,” I say, using my fork to chase a bit of scallop around the plate. “Are you really this put together, or is it just that you have better stories than everyone else?”
He doesn’t answer immediately. Instead, he shifts in his chair, glances up at the ceiling like the answer’s hidden somewhere in the rafters.
“I think,” he says, “I’m just good at covering the cracks. If you looked closer, you’d see how much duct tape holds it all together.”
His phone buzzes again, a mosquito that refuses to be ignored. This time he looks down, thumb hovering, before pushing it away again. When he meets my eyes, there’s something rawer than before.
“Sorry,” he repeats, softer. “I’m all yours.”
I wonder if that’s ever been true for anyone.
I let him talk—about the impossible client, about the pitch gone wrong, about a friend who moved to Prague and still sends him postcards with “Wish you were beer” written in Sharpie. But I’m watching now, every flicker of attention, every glance at the glowing rectangle beside his plate.
When the next buzz comes, it’s mid-sentence. He breaks off, glances at the phone, and this time, he reads the message. His face doesn’t change, but his shoulders stiffen, just for a second.
I feel my hand tighten around the stem of my glass. The wine is warmer now, a slow burn. My eyes narrow—reflex, not choice—and I count to five before responding.
“I like a man who multitasks,” I say, voice sugar over steel.
He smiles, but it’s an apology, not an admission.
For a moment, neither of us speaks. The hum of the restaurant swells: forks on china, the low laughter of strangers, the distant ring of someone’s champagne toast. I let the silence press on my ears, a test to see which of us will crack first.
It’s him. “It’s just work,” he says, as if that explains everything.
“Isn’t it always?”
He laughs, a brief, airless sound. “You know how it is.”
I do. I know exactly how it is. We work together—not in the same department, but the same company.
By the time we finish, the plates are clean and my wine glass is empty. I feel the tickle of alcohol in my veins, a gentle fuzziness that makes the edges of the evening smudge together. He flags down the server, pays with a black card, and stands, stretching like a man who’s just come in from the cold.
Before we can leave together, his phone buzzes again. Not a vibration this time—an insistent, digital chime.
He grabs for it, reflex, then catches himself and flips it face-down with a snap that’s a touch too forceful. The corners of his mouth go tight.
“Persistent,” I say, aiming for casual. “Is that the sleep app checking up on you?”
He doesn’t laugh. “Probably just my assistant. She’s thorough.”
He reaches out and brushes my fingers with his. The contact is warm and deliberate, but instead of speaking he leans in and presses a quick kiss to my cheek. His lips linger for the barest second—heavy with something I can’t name—then he stands abruptly.
“I’ve got to run,” he says, voice low. Before I can answer, he's already backing away, hands raised in apology. "I'm so sorry, it's getting late anyway, and we both have work in the morning." His eyebrow lifts, waiting for my agreement, but all I feel is the whiplash between the man who'd leaned in close across the table and this stranger preparing his exit. The restaurant noise rises around us—clattering plates, laughter, glasses clinking—as his attention, which had felt so complete, dissolves into nothing.
While he walks away, I sit back down, my pulse thrumming. I twist the band of my watch between my thumb and forefinger—my nervous tic whenever I’m on the brink of something I can’t control. My breath catches, half hope, half dread.
He’s at the door, phone pressed to his ear. Through the window I see him straightening his coat, settling into the streetlight’s glow. He laughs—soft, relieved—into the receiver. The caller says something on the other end, and his smile widens, bright enough to light the pavement.
I want to call him back, demand what this means, but my hand won’t move. Instead, I watch him disappear into the night, his silhouette swallowed by the city’s hush. The windowpane fogs under my fingertips as I press my palm to it, remembering the warmth of his hand on mine, the promise I thought I heard.
Behind me, the waiter clears our plates. I glance down at the crumbs of dessert we never finished and wonder if anything was ever real. The thread of possibility he left behind coils tight in my chest.
I stand, leave a tip on the table, and slip out into the cool air. The streets are half-lit, cars passing in silent ribbons of light. He’s gone, but I can still taste the memory of his kiss.
I walk the few blocks home, replaying his farewell and that quick smile into the phone. When I reach my door, I pause, hand on the doorknob, and let the night settle around me. The watch on my wrist has stopped ticking—perhaps joining me in this waiting game. I step inside, the door clicking shut behind me, and all I have is the echo of his departure and the question of who was really on the other end of that line.
