Day 17 - Unfortunately, So Do I

Wednesday had been a bad day for everyone except the weather.

The weather was lovely.

This seemed rude.

By nine thirty, a plumbing issue had opened part of a ceiling Elliot had been assured was finished.

By eleven, the flooring supplier had discovered the concept of back order.

At one twelve, a subcontractor used the phrase unexpected condition to describe something Elliot had warned him about three weeks earlier.

At three, Marcus walked into Elliot’s office holding a clipboard.

“No.”

“I haven’t said anything.”

“You’re carrying paper.”

“That feels discriminatory.”

“What?”

“I need a favor.”

“No.”

Marcus pulled out the chair anyway.

“Remember Henderson?”

“Yes.”

“He wants someone from our side at the walkthrough tomorrow.”

“You’re someone from our side.”

“I have dental surgery.”

Elliot looked at him.

“Actual dental surgery?”

Marcus placed one hand over his chest.

“You wound me.”

“You once told me you had food poisoning so you could avoid the annual safety seminar.”

“I did have food poisoning.”

“You sent me a picture from a golf course.”

“That could have been old.”

“It had that day’s date on the cart screen.”

Marcus frowned.

“Technology has ruined friendship.”

Elliot took the clipboard.

“What time?”

“Nine.”

“Fine.”

Marcus smiled.

“Thank you.”

“Go away.”

“You seem happier.”

Elliot looked up.

Marcus shrugged.

“Not happy. Less...compressed.”

“That’s not a word people use about other people.”

“It is now.”

Elliot handed the clipboard back.

“Dental surgery.”

“Very serious.”

“Bring documentation.”

Marcus stood.

“You’re becoming cruel.”

“That’s grief.”

Marcus stopped.

Then laughed.

Elliot did too.

And this time, he noticed something.

The laugh didn’t hurt.

Not afterward.

No guilt.

No sudden mental apology to Megan.

Just a laugh.

Small progress, apparently.

He refused to put it in a spreadsheet.

That evening, Elliot went upstairs with leftover Chinese food and found The Smoking Car already open on the desk.

He had left it that way Tuesday night.

The margin note waited at the top of the page:

Elliot will hate this sentence.

Beneath it, his reply:

Correct.
Keep it.

He sat.

“You win.”

Then began again from the beginning.

THE SMOKING CAR

Paris, 1927

The woman knew the man was going to annoy her before he spoke.

It was the suitcase.

Not his.

Hers.

He had moved it.

She stopped in the aisle.

“Why is my suitcase there?”

The man looked up from his newspaper.

“Where?”

“There.”

He followed her finger.

“Because it was blocking the aisle.”

“It was beside my seat.”

“It was in the aisle.”

“It was adjacent to the aisle.”

“It was an obstacle.”

“It was luggage.”

“It can be both.”

She stared at him.

He went back to his newspaper.

This was unacceptable.

She lifted the suitcase from the rack and placed it precisely where it had been before.

The man lowered the paper.

“You moved it back.”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Because that is where I put it.”

“It’s blocking the aisle.”

“You’ve mentioned.”

A porter squeezed past and struck his knee on the suitcase.

The man looked at her.

The woman looked at the porter.

“Sorry.”

The porter continued walking.

The man folded the newspaper.

Carefully.

Too carefully.

She disliked him even more.

“You fold newspapers like they’re going to be inspected.”

“They fit better that way.”

“By whom?”

“What?”

“Who is checking?”

“No one.”

“Then live dangerously.”

He looked at her suitcase.

“I believe one of us already is.”

Elliot laughed.

Not because the scene was especially hilarious.

Because he knew exactly what Megan was doing.

She had once accused him of folding road maps with “moral superiority.”

He had informed her there was a correct way to fold a map.

She had asked whether the map had personally requested his protection.

He read on.

The train left Paris forty minutes late.

The woman spent the first ten complaining about the seat.

The man spent the next five pretending not to hear her.

At minute sixteen, she leaned across the aisle.

“Do you always sit like that?”

He looked down at himself.

“Like what?”

“Prepared.”

“For what?”

“I don’t know. Evacuation.”

“I’m sitting.”

“You’re sitting with intent.”

“That sentence has no meaning.”

“It has plenty.”

He returned to his newspaper.

She watched him for another moment.

“Do you have a schedule?”

“Yes.”

“Of course you do.”

He looked over the page.

“Do you not?”

“I know generally where I’m going.”

“That is not a schedule.”

“It’s more interesting.”

“That is not a defense.”

“It is to me.”

The woman smiled.

The man did not.

Not yet.

They arrived at their destination after dark and discovered the hotel had lost one reservation.

His.

Naturally.

The woman found this hilarious.

“You planned?”

“Yes.”

“You confirmed?”

“Yes.”

“In writing?”

“Yes.”

“And still there is no room?”

“That appears to be the situation.”

She leaned against the front desk.

“This must be very difficult for you.”

He looked at her.

“You’re enjoying this.”

“Immensely.”

The hotel clerk spoke rapid French.

The man answered in slow, careful French.

The woman winced.

“What?”

“Your accent is frightening.”

“He understands me.”

“So would a hostage.”

The clerk covered a smile.

The man noticed.

“I dislike you.”

“No, you don’t.”

“We met four hours ago.”

“Exactly. You haven’t had enough time to dislike me properly.”

The clerk found a room elsewhere.

The only problem was the rain.

Sheets of it.

The man opened his umbrella.

The woman opened hers.

A gust of wind turned it inside out immediately.

She stared at the broken umbrella.

The man said nothing.

“You say one word.”

“I didn't.”

“You thought several.”

He shifted his umbrella over both of them.

“Come on.”

She stepped beneath it.

“You’re holding it crooked.”

“So you don’t get wet.”

“You’re getting wet.”

“Yes.”

“That seems inefficient.”

He looked at her.

She looked at him.

Something passed between them.

Recognition, perhaps.

Or simply irritation remembering itself.

Then they both laughed.

Elliot paused.

There it was again.

Not the reincarnation piece.

Them.

The rhythm.

Megan had understood something Elliot hadn't been able to name until now.

They had spent twenty-five years annoying each other in precisely compatible ways.

He turned the page.

At the second hotel, the woman discovered she had left one glove on the train.

The man looked at her.

“No.”

“I didn’t say anything.”

“You’re going to tell me I should have checked the seat.”

“You should have checked the seat.”

“There.”

“What?”

“That expression.”

“What expression?”

“The one you get when the universe confirms your personality.”

He laughed despite himself.

The woman pointed.

“That.”

“What?”

“That face.”

“My face?”

“You look completely different when you forget to be responsible.”

He became quiet.

She seemed to realize she had said something more intimate than intended.

Then recovered.

“Still irritating. Just less severe.”

He took off his gloves.

Handed her one.

She looked at it.

“What am I supposed to do with one glove?”

“Wear it.”

“And leave the other hand to die?”

“You lost your own.”

“That feels judgmental.”

“It is.”

She put it on.

Too large.

Warm.

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

The hallway went quiet.

Neither moved toward their room.

Finally the man said, “Have we done this before?”

She looked at him.

“Lost a glove?”

“This.”

“This hallway?”

“You’re being deliberately difficult.”

“That is one of my better qualities.”

He smiled.

She tilted her head.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

“That was very clearly something.”

The man went still.

The woman did too.

For some reason, they both laughed.

Neither knew why.

Elliot leaned back.

“That one is ours.”

He said it out loud without thinking.

Not the line exactly.

The structure of it.

That was very clearly something.

Megan had used variations of that exchange across several train pieces now.

Apparently she found it funny.

Apparently they had some version of it in real life often enough that it had become reusable material.

He tried to remember the original.

There probably wasn’t one.

Some marriages had private sayings.

Others had private syntax.

Maybe this was theirs.

The Paris pair met again twelve years later.

Megan gave no explanation for the coincidence.

No grand destiny.

The woman was exiting a bookstore.

The man was walking past.

They stopped.

He was older.

So was she.

He had more gray.

She had cut her hair.

For several seconds, neither spoke.

Then the woman looked at him and said:

“Oh, no.”

He smiled.

“That seems rude.”

“I had almost forgotten you.”

“No, you hadn’t.”

“You’re still insufferable.”

“You moved your suitcase.”

“I did not.”

“You absolutely did.”

She laughed.

“Unfortunately, I remember you.”

The man looked at her.

Something in his face softened.

“Unfortunately?”

She smiled.

“So do you.”

“I do.”

They stood in the street while people moved around them.

Different lives had happened in between.

Marriage.

Divorce.

Work.

Deaths.

Things neither knew yet.

The woman glanced at the bookstore behind her.

“Coffee?”

The man checked his watch.

She saw him do it.

He saw her see.

Slowly, he lowered his hand.

“Yes.”

She blinked.

“Yes?”

“Yes.”

“You don’t need to check your schedule?”

“No.”

“Are you dying?”

“Probably eventually.”

She stared.

Then laughed so hard she had to lean against the window.

The man waited.

When she recovered, she looked at him.

“You’re different.”

“No.”

“No?”

“I’m trying.”

That quieted her.

She opened the bookstore door.

“Come on.”

He followed.

This time, he did not ask what the plan was.

The story ended there.

Elliot grinned.

Actually grinned.

“Subtle.”

Megan had rewritten him.

Not completely.

She had left the watch.

The schedule.

The annoying competence.

Then let the man loosen his grip by degrees.

It should have irritated him.

Instead, it felt affectionate.

Megan had apparently believed he was improvable.

That was generous.

He picked up the printed copy.

There were notes everywhere.

Too much bickering? No.

Give him one nice line so Elliot doesn't sue.

She needs to be wrong sometimes too.

Then, beside the second meeting:

Do NOT make this romantic too soon. They have earned irritation.

Elliot laughed again.

Hard.

He put the page down because his eyes had started watering.

Not grief.

Laughter.

That mattered enough that he noticed.

He leaned back in Megan’s chair and let it happen.

No apology.

No tightening afterward.

No sense that enjoying something without her was betrayal.

Because this was with her.

Not literally.

He knew the difference.

But Megan had written these jokes.

Megan had chosen that sentence.

Megan had looked at some fictional man being impossible and thought:

Elliot.

And then written it down.

There was something almost embarrassingly intimate in being teased by the dead.

He wiped his eyes.

“Very funny.”

On the desk, the manuscript offered no remorse.

He picked up the pencil.

Beneath:

Give him one nice line so Elliot doesn't sue.

he wrote:

Still considering it.

Then, after a moment:

This is funny.

He looked at the words.

Too plain.

But true.

Then he added:

You were funny.

His hand stopped.

The sentence changed the room.

Were.

He had gotten better at the grammar.

Not good.

Better.

He stared at it for a while.

Then realized something.

For weeks after Megan died, whenever people talked about her, they used the largest words.

Brilliant.

Generous.

Talented.

Strong.

Loved.

All true.

But grief had made everyone describe Megan as if they were writing the plaque beneath a statue.

She had also been funny.

Petty about restaurant bread.

Unreasonably judgmental about decorative pillows.

Terrible at remembering passwords.

Able to hold a grudge against an appliance.

She had once refused to return to a coffee shop because the barista had described a muffin as “moist-forward.”

Elliot laughed again just remembering it.

That was her too.

Maybe especially her.

He looked down at the manuscript.

The stories were not only preserving some grand theory of recognition.

They were preserving Megan’s sense of him.

And herself.

Not idealized.

Recognizable.

There was a difference.

His phone rang.

Tammy.

He answered.

“Hey.”

“Why are you laughing?”

He hadn’t realized he still was.

“I’m reading something Megan wrote.”

Tammy became quiet for half a second.

Then:

“Is she making fun of you?”

“Yes.”

“Good.”

“That reaction feels disloyal.”

“To whom?”

“Me.”

“I’ve known you twenty-five years.”

“Twenty-four.”

“Long enough.”

Elliot smiled.

“She wrote a man who folds maps correctly.”

Tammy started laughing.

“See?”

“I don’t know why everyone thinks this is funny.”

“Because you said ‘correctly.’”

“There is a correct way.”

Tammy laughed harder.

For several minutes they talked about nothing important.

Megan’s terrible directions.

Elliot’s insistence on leaving early.

The time Megan packed for a weekend and somehow brought seven shirts but no pants.

When the call ended, Elliot stayed in the chair.

He realized that for the first time since January, he had spent nearly an hour talking about Megan without discussing her illness or her death.

Just Megan.

He looked at the page again.

You were funny.

Then crossed out one word.

The line now read:

You are funny.

Elliot stared at it.

He knew what grammar required.

He left it anyway.