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Ezra ate his food but he didn’t taste it. His entire body — every cell, every atom — was focused on Candace. He’d wanted to run after her when she pulled from his grasp and ask her if what he thought he’d seen in her eyes was real. He wanted to know what she’d been thinking during those few seconds. Was it the way he used to love kissing behind her knees just so she’d giggle, or all the times he’d coaxed her onto his face so he could watch her come on his tongue? Did she remember how much he used to love holding her as they fell asleep? Did she know that he dreamed about holding her like that every other day of the year? And those were just the first questions that came to mind. He had so many more; eighteen years’ worth of questions he’d been swallowing, too unsure of the answer to muster the nerve to utter them.
But someone doesn’t become a new person overnight or in the first few hours of a long-haul flight. If that were possible, Ezra would have been out of his seat and down the aisle after her before she’d gotten more than a few rows away. He’d tell her how much he regretted all the times he hadn’t chased after her or bit his tongue instead of telling her how much he loved her. But the other flight attendant had glared at Ezra before following after her, the seatbelt sign was illuminated, and Marty was still trying to figure out what was going on.
But the thing that really kept Ezra in his seat was that voice in his head that reminded him how pathetic he was to still be hoping he saw something in her eyes that looked like love; something that mirrored his own lovesick adoration.
Still, Ezra kept his eyes on the front of the plane, waiting for Candace to reappear. When she did, her face was a mask as she rushed down the aisle toward the main cabin. She didn’t even look his way. He tried to catch the eye of the other flight attendant when he came to collect their trays, but he avoided Ezra’s gaze as well. He didn’t know what else to do with himself, so he sat and stared at the seatbelt sign, waiting for it to turn off or for Candace to come back.
Time passed slowly. His leg started bouncing again. He checked his messages. A few emails from his team in Quito. Nothing from Mei. The overhead lights dimmed and then finally the seatbelt sign turned off. Ezra was unbuckled and out of his seat in a heartbeat.
“Where ya going?” Marty asked.
Ezra didn’t answer. He pulled the curtain open and sped through Business Class into Economy. The aisle was almost entirely clear, and he saw her, in the back galley, talking to one of the other flight attendants. He stalked toward her determined to... do something. As he walked, other passengers jumped up from their seats and began to walk in front of him toward the rear bathrooms, blocking his view of her. Eventually, he found himself in a line for the toilets, four other people standing in between him and Candace.
He tapped the shoulder of the woman in front of him. “Excuse me, can I—?”
“No, wait in line,” she said quickly.
“No, sorry, you don’t understand,” Ezra said.
She rolled her eyes over her shoulder, “That’s what they all say.”
He frowned and squinted at her in confusion. “Um, I’m not really sure what that means, but I don’t need to go to the bathroom. I just need to get past you.”
“Sure, buddy,” she said, but didn’t move.
Ezra sighed and resigned himself to waiting in line, shuffling forward slowly. He leaned around the woman in front of him every now and then to make sure Candace was still there, even though she’d have had to pass him to go anywhere else. Finally, the woman in front of him was at the head of the line and a toilet door opened. They all stepped aside for an older woman to pass and as soon as the toilet door closed, Ezra moved quickly into the back galley. His throat felt dry when he swallowed and his stomach was in painful knots.
“Candace, we need to talk,” Ezra said in a soft voice.
She froze, but didn’t turn to him.
The other flight attendant gasped. Ezra turned to him and smiled. “Sorry, I—”
“Oh my god, I’m a huge fan,” he said.
Ezra could feel his cheeks warming. “Um, thanks. I really appreciate it.” And he did, even if he didn’t understand it. “I just need to talk to Candace.”
“Is there something wrong? Do you need me to get you anything? A glass of wine? An extra dessert?”
“Um, no. Everything’s fine,” he said, his eyes darting to her back. “I just... Would you mind if I... I mean if we...?”
“I don’t know...” he said, his eyebrows bunched in confusion.
“It’s okay, Mark,” Candace said. She finally turned around, but she didn’t look at Ezra. “Can you take over the evening drink service in the main cabin? Tell Jorge to help you when he’s finished in First.”
Mark nodded. “If you’re sure,” he said, his eyes darting between them. “Oh my god,” he whispered as he walked away.
Ezra shuffled out of Mark’s way in the tight space. He turned to watch him go. The line to the bathroom was just a couple of people now. Ezra guessed this would be the most privacy they could hope for under the circumstances.
When he turned back to Candace, she was looking at him, but she averted her eyes rather than make eye contact and it broke his heart.
“You shouldn’t be back here, Ezra.” She sounded sad and Ezra had never been able to handle when anything dimmed Candace’s shine.
“Candace, I’m not engaged,” he whispered, taking a couple of steps toward her. Not enough to crowd her, but closer, nonetheless.
She finally lifted her eyes to meet his and he felt the way he’d felt that first New Year’s Eve when she’d leaned toward him: like the sun was shining down on him because Candace Garret knew his name. Candace Garret was looking at him. Candace Garret cared that he was single.
“You said—?”
“That old guy was about to tell me about his very single daughter or granddaughter or next-door neighbor. Everyone I’ve met in the past few years has tried to become my own personal matchmaker. I was just trying to head him off.”
She squinted at him. “You hate lying.”
He shrugged. “I do, but sometimes I have to.”
She sucked her bottom lip into her mouth and shifted her eyes away.
“But not to you,” he added. “I’ve never lied to you.”
She looked at him skeptically, which hurt.
“So you’re not engaged,” she said, sounding just as unsure as she looked.
“I’m not seeing anyone either,” he said. He had been. Over the years, there’d been a series of models he’d met at those strange fundraisers he went to but hated, and then a hasty three-month fling during the summer with an astrophysicist he’d met at a political event. But old habits die hard, and he’d broken up with her in the fall, unconsciously giving himself time to get over a woman who was just a placeholder for Candace. His entire life had been one long holding pattern as he waited for a future with Candace he’d been sure until recently would come. Even in the past year when he’d committed himself to getting over her, a part of him had still been waiting for her. Loving Candace came as naturally to Ezra as breathing, pathetic as it was.
“But you were... We’re both...” she started but didn’t finish.
He stepped forward again. Vaguely he heard the toilet doors open and close but none of it mattered. He was close enough now to touch her. He lifted his hand to her arm and stroked his thumb up to her elbow and back down to her wrist. The touch was fairy light. Her head lifted and their eyes met.
“I didn’t show up last year,” she said, even though he knew that.
“I did,” he said, just in case she didn’t. And by the way she worried her bottom lip between her teeth, he guessed that maybe she hadn’t. “Why didn’t you?”
She shook her head. “Mei needed me. We went to the City to go dancing.” Her smile changed from wistful to pained. “We rang in the new year in the bathroom of some dance club. Mei was crying on my shoulder.”
Ezra had a flash of a memory; Miles at midnight, a probably warm bottle of beer in his hand, his gaze blank as he stared at a painting on the wall. Mei had bought it to decorate their first apartment together after college. “I’m sorry,” he whispered.
“So am I,” she said. “You weren’t going to go this year?”
He smoothed circles around her wrist. “I couldn’t bear to show up at Miles’s house and watch him pretend he didn’t miss Mei, waiting for you not to show up again,” he admitted. It felt like a two-ton weight had been lifted from his shoulders.
“You could have called me,” she said.
He could have laughed and cried at the same time. “Could I? How would your boyfriend have felt about that?” His voice was harsh, full of all the bitterness he’d suppressed while watching that relationship play out over social media. She winced. He hated himself.
“Why did you do it?” he asked. He didn’t elaborate. He wasn’t even certain if he could have. There were so many things she’d done, so many times she’d turned away from him right when he thought they were on the precipice of something great. He’d always thought he knew Candace better than anyone, but he could never understand why she kept running from him, no matter how hard he tried.
“Why did I get a boyfriend?” she asked.
He nodded. This was one of the questions, so he went with it. He didn’t expect the bitter laugh or the single tear that fell down her right cheek. He had to force himself not to move his free hand to cup her face and brush it away.
She tilted her head to look at him. “What was the name of the last model you dated, Ezra?”
He froze.
“How long did that last? What about the one before her? And before her? Did you take them out on dates? Buy them flowers for Valentine’s Day? Did you go on vacations together?”
Candace’s eyes were glassy with unshed tears and Ezra could feel the pressure of his own tears as his face warmed with the accusation in her words, even if he didn’t understand it. And when she brought it all together, he wished he could have stayed ignorant.
“You took them out though, right?” Candace continued. “You went out in public with them. You took them to your business events. You didn’t practically ignore them all year just to hook up with them in secret.” Candace pulled her arm from his grasp and swiped at her teary eyes. She stepped back, putting more distance between them. When she looked at him again, her eyes weren’t sad or angry. There was a depth of pain he’d never seen there before and it broke him anew to realize that she could ever feel that way about him.
“Don’t ask me why I dated someone who had the nerve to tell me how he felt faster than twenty years too late,” she ground out. “Besides, you’re a billionaire now.”
“Candace, I’m—”
“I’m sure you can find someone to hook up with you on all the major holidays. It just won’t be me. Not anymore.”
Ezra shook his head and reached for her again, a tear slipping from his eyes. “Is this a joke?” he said, which was the wrong thing to say.
Candace’s laugh was so hurt and angry and bitter.
“That’s not what I meant, Candace and you know it.”
“Do I?”
“Why would you think I wouldn’t want to date you? Why would you ever think I only wanted to be with you on New Year’s Eve?”
She laughed again and he wanted to scream. Not at her, but at the universe. This wasn’t at all the way he’d expected this conversation to go. Never, in all the years he’d been waiting for them to be honest with one another, could he have imagined this.
“Because you told me so,” she said, swiping at her face again.
“When?” he practically screamed.
“The last night we were together. Just before you fell asleep. And you just told me that you’d never lie to me, right, Ezra? Never?”
“Candace—”
“What’s going on back here?”
Ezra turned to see Jorge looking at them with wide eyes.
“I—” he started, but Candace cut him off.
“Nothing,” she said in a flat tone. “5C is going back to his seat now.” She turned to him and her beautiful brown eyes were dead. “We’re done here.”
“Candace,” he said, still shaking his head.
But Jorge once again stepped protectively in front of her. “Let me escort you back to your seat, sir,” he said with the thinnest veneer of professionalism.
Ezra normally would have loved that, would have found a kinship with anyone who wanted to protect Candace. But the realization that he was the thing she needed to be protected from was too much for him to handle.
He let the man lead him away but he turned back to Candace just before he left the galley. She stared blankly at the wall with haunted eyes. Ezra felt numb and broken as he walked up the length of the plane back to his seat, completely and utterly alone for the first time in a long time.