Palm Shadows at Sunset

Maria traced the condensation on her glass, watching the orange sunset bleed into the hotel pool. She'd flown three thousand miles for a conference she didn't care about, only to find herself sitting beside the one person she'd spent five years avoiding.

"You're not drinking your wine," David said, not looking at her. His gaze fixed on some distant point beyond the pool's artificial blue.

"Not much of a drinker anymore."

"Since when?"

"Since I realized alcohol makes it harder to lie to myself."

He turned then, and the years dropped away. His hair was thinner, his face lined, but his eyes still held that devastating warmth. The same warmth that had convinced her to trust him with the promotion she'd earned. The same warmth that had disappeared when he'd taken the credit for her project, smiling through her shock and confusion like nothing had happened.

"I missed you, Maria. We were friends."

She laughed, a short sharp sound. "Friends don't do what you did."

"That was ten years ago. I was different."

"Were you?"

He reached for her hand across the small table, palm up. An invitation. An apology. A test.

Maria stood instead. "I should go. Early flight tomorrow."

"Maria—"

"You took everything from me that mattered. My work. My belief that people are basically good. My ability to trust anyone. You think five years of radio silence followed by one sunset drink fixes that?"

"I hoped—"

"That's what you do best, isn't it? Hope someone else will do the heavy lifting of your redemption."

She walked away without looking back, leaving him alone with the orange sky, the silent pool, and the palm shadows stretching like bruises across everything he'd broken but couldn't fix.