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“But I thought you—”

“What did you think?” Landry asked quietly. “That I did what you did?”

He was staring at Landry, trying to understand something.

“We were never the same,” my boyfriend said icily.

“No,” Will agreed, and I saw all the pain and all the longing on his face.

It made me uncomfortable, seeing another man utterly grieving for a lost love who was standing right in front of him. I offered him my hand to break the spell.

He didn’t take it; he just looked at me. He didn’t even lift his hand. It was very obvious that he had no intention of touching me at all.

“You must be starved,” Cece announced into the awkward silence as she walked back over to us, taking Landry’s hand, patting it. “Come sit down and eat. I want you to tell me everything.”

The table was big and round, so nobody was stuck sitting at one end or the other. It was also lavishly set like nothing I had ever seen. There were water goblets already filled and an orchard of fruit on each place setting. My mother would have loved it. Our idea of Sunday morning breakfast was a serve-yourself line in the kitchen where everyone piled on their own food and you got utensils and a napkin at the end. At my apartment, there was a paper towel roll instead.

There was a choice: strawberry crepes, eggs Benedict, or something else I couldn’t pronounce. I went with the crepes, wishing we had stopped somewhere. What I really wanted was steak and eggs and lots of salsa and pancakes and… just more.

I had never seen a waiter in a house, but there were two, bringing us a hot washcloth to wipe our hands on and then juice and coffee.

“Landry, darling, what do you do?”

As I sat there and listened and ate and drank the coffee that I would have died without, I realized again how different it was from what I had imagined. There was no tearful emotional scene. Landry did not attack his parents; they didn’t tell him how sorry they were. It was all so civil, so “Are the crepes to your liking?” “Oh yes, they’re lovely, thank you.” My stomach started to flutter with how fake it all was.

Landry explained about his business, and his sister, who was in pharmaceutical sales but had just launched her own Christmas ornament line on Etsy, was very interested to hear how he was doing. He gave her the web address so she could look him up and then passed her his phone so she could see the pictures of his gallery.

“Ohmygod, Lan.” She beamed over at him. “It’s beautiful, and your pieces are just gorgeous. I, uhm—” She cleared her throat. “—couldn’t get you to—”

“I brought something for you and Mom,” he told her, turning to get into his messenger bag, which was hanging on the back of his chair.

“You did?” Cece lit up, excited.

“Yeah, Chris already got his.”

“Let me see,” Jocelyn demanded.

Chris rolled up the sleeve of his cardigan and showed them all the triple-wrap amber bracelet. Jocelyn leaned over to examine it.

“You sew each one of these beads in. That’s amazing,” she told him.

“And his has a piece of carnelian beside the toggle clasp to ward off the evil eye.”

“I love this; where’s mine?”

He chuckled, turned, and passed his mother her gift bag, and then he stood to lean across the table to offer another to Jocelyn. They were drawstring bags, lightly beaded, a navy one for his sister and a maroon one for his mother. The velvet bags he put his jewelry in all had his logo and “Asil” in Parchment font stamped into a leather piece on one side.

“I love this bag.” Jocelyn smiled at him as she touched it. “It reminds me of a Middle Eastern bazaar or something.”

“Exactly,” he agreed and grinned at her.

“What does ‘Asil’ mean?” she asked him.

“It means pure in Arabic.”

“Oh, I just love stuff like this.”

He seemed very pleased at the compliment, but again, as he would be from a stranger in his store. When my aunts complimented him, he puddled into goo.