Digital Palmistry

The iPhone sat between them on the white tablecloth, a silent third guest at dinner. Maya watched its screen flicker with notifications — work emails, calendar reminders, nothing that required attention at 8 PM on a Friday. But Richard kept glancing at it, like a smoker eyeing a pack of cigarettes.

"You should just check it," she said, cutting into her salmon.

"It can wait." He reached for his wine instead. "How was the conference?"

Maya swallowed. The spinach from her salad left a gritty feeling between her teeth. She should have ordered the mixed greens instead of this pretentious organic stuff that tasted like disappointment.

"The conference was fine." She wiped her mouth. "Richard, are you happy?"

The question hung there. A waiter passed by, clearing plates from the next table.

"Of course I'm happy." He didn't look at her. He looked at his phone.

She reached across the table and took his hand. His palm was slick with sweat, though the restaurant was cool. She remembered how, six years ago, he'd confessed his secrets with his hands — nervous gestures, fingers tapping against his knee, palms open and trusting. Now his hands were closed, guarded.

"The screen's cracked," she said, tracing the lines on his palm with her thumb. "I've been meaning to ask — what happened?"

"Dropped it at work." He pulled his hand back. "Maya, can we not do this tonight?"

"Do what?" She felt something sharp — spinach, stuck in her tooth. "Talk to each other?"

"You know what." Richard picked up his phone, unlocked it. His thumb moved instinctively to a particular app, then stopped. "Maya, I've been offered a position. In Chicago."

The air left the room. Chicago. Without her.

"When were you going to tell me?" she asked, her voice steady.

"Tonight. I was going to tell you tonight." He set the phone down gently, like handling something fragile. "But you keep —" He stopped himself. "You keep asking if I'm happy. The answer is complicated."

"Complicated like you're leaving me, or complicated like you wish you could?"

"Complicated like I love you," he said, "but I don't remember the last time I felt like myself."

Maya looked at his palm again, resting on the white tablecloth. The life line, the heart line, the head line — she'd never believed in palmistry, but she'd spent enough time tracing those lines to know what they meant. This was the hand that had held hers through her mother's funeral. This was the hand that had built their bookshelves, that had learned to cook her favorite recipes.

This was the hand that was letting go.

"The spinach," she said, touching her tooth. "I have something in my teeth, don't I?"

Richard almost smiled. "Yeah. A little."

She excused herself to the restroom. In the mirror, she picked at the stubborn green fleck with her fingernail until it came free. Her reflection looked back at her — tired, clear-eyed, strangely calm. When she returned to the table, the iPhone was dark. Richard was waiting.

"Chicago," she said, sitting down. "When do you leave?"

"Two weeks."

She nodded. "Then let's not waste them."

They ordered dessert. They talked about Chicago winters and the bookshelf they'd built together and whether either of them still remembered the recipe for her grandmother's lasagna. And for the first time in months, Richard didn't check his phone once.