What the Palm Reader Didn't Say

The lightning strike had been visible from three blocks away—a violent fork of white that split the Havana sky just as Marco's key turned in the lock. Elena sat on their balcony, her back to the sliding door, a half-empty glass of rum warming on the wrought-iron table beside her.

"You're still up," he said, and there was something in his voice—relief, maybe, or just exhaustion from the double shift at the port.

"The cat's gone again."

"Biscoito will come back. He always does."

"That's not the point."

The silence between them had developed a texture lately. Like the air before a storm, charged and thick. She'd been reading palms at the tourist market for extra cash, running her thumb along strangers' lifelines, making up stories about their futures when she couldn't even decipher her own.

Marco crossed the balcony, dropped into the chair opposite hers. His hand found hers automatically, palm to palm, fingers lacing. The gesture was so practiced it made her chest ache.

"What did she tell you?" he asked, and for a terrible second she thought he knew about the lifeline she'd read that afternoon—the woman who'd grabbed Elena's wrist, studied her hand, then whispered: "He's going to break your heart, you know. Not because he wants to. Because he has to."

"Who?"

"The palm reader. You came back weird quiet."

"She said I'd live a long life."

Marco laughed, short and humorless. "Did she charge extra for that lie?"

Another flash of lightning. This time, closer. The storm was moving in from the water.

"I'm leaving Tuesday," he said, and it was like the sky had finally opened.

"Tuesday."

"The shipping company offered me the Miami run. It's permanent."

"And you weren't going to ask if I wanted to come."

"We've had this conversation, El. Five times. You always say no."

"Because you never actually ask. You announce."

Their cat materialized on the railing, tail twitching, yellow eyes reflecting the balcony light. Biscoito, who belonged to no one and therefore belonged to everyone. Who would remain when the furniture was sold, when the lease expired, when whatever this was finally dissolved completely.

Lightning struck somewhere on the harbor. The boom followed seconds later, rattling the glasses on the table.

"Read my palm," Marco said suddenly.

"What?"

"Like you do for the tourists. Tell me what you see."

She should have refused. Should have gone inside, packed the first box, started the unraveling. Instead she took his hand, turned it over in hers. The scar across his knuckle from the motorcycle accident. The callus at the base of his finger from the warehouse work. The lifeline that curved deep and sure.

"I see a man who makes decisions," she said, "and expects everyone else to live with them."

"That's not a prediction. That's a complaint."

"I see a man who thinks love is about destination instead of departure."

"El—"

"And I see," she traced the line beneath his thumb, "that you're going to Miami alone."

The rain began then—a sudden torrential downpour that sent them both scrambling inside, leaving the cat to the storm, leaving the glasses to fill with water, leaving the future exactly where it had been all along: uncertain, unspoken, and completely out of their hands.