Married By My Father's Debt

will reading I had t

. My fathers slippers were still by the door. His newspaper from that morning was still folded on the kitchen table; the crossword half finished his handwriting trailing

tween a bookstore and a flower shop, the kind of place with mis

ected from all of it. People walked by with their lives intact. Grocery bags, phone calls, laughter shared between friends

kly into my cup that I fi

He wasn't reading it. He was watching the door with tension in his shoulders lik

hout fully processing them that he looked like he was bracing fo

rs that filled out his simple gray sweater in a way that seemed almost unfair. The stranger's hair was brown, short with a wave to it that looked like he'd run his fingers through

way. Instead I offered

ension in the stranger's jaw and for a moment the stranger didn't look like a stranger with

rangers voice low and warm carrying eas

st with strangers. Grief had stripped away some of my usual filters leav

r completely. There was a heaviness behind the strangers eyes that matched my own, a kind of recognition t

m the stranger. "Do you mind? I could use the

s and my father had just died and I had a business to somehow learn how to run and thi

myself say ins

offer mine either. There was something freeing. About the anonymity of it. About being just a w

about to inherit a legacy I never asked for. I was simply a woman sitting acros

d Chloe yet. How guilty I felt for not visiting more in the last year, how terrified I was of stepping into a role I'd

intentional calling it "extra crispy" like that had been the plan all along. Freddie laughed

e was a man, " Fr

inking back tears. "H

g painful across Freddie's face. Envy, maybe or grief of a different kind. "Yo

About who Freddie had been waiting for when I first walked in.. There was a wall behind Freddies eyes that

pass and something told me

what he did for work.

amily is involved in a lot of things. I don't al

s depending on me, the legacy I hadn't chosen but couldn't abandon. It felt strange and comforting even to sit across

nk it was. With an ease that struck me as odd for someone who'd claimed moments earlier to have

one of the places I can just sit. Nobody bot

t from you?" I asked, genui

e said finally with a humorless laugh. "Or nothing at all which is somehow worse because

voice made me want to reach across the table and take Freddie's hand to tell him t

ead "you don't seem like someone p

something that mattered more than I realized. "That might be the thing a

ore than once despite hating it, the strange comfort of foods that remind you of childhood even when they're object

ally laughing, for the time s

t. It had felt like something in itself a single afternoon meant

e long moment we simply looked at each other, the noise of the café

eddie said softly. "You seem like someo

though I didn't fully

s. It was the first time since my father died that I felt like myself again. This was all because of a man I did not know well. I only know hi

I was reading my fathers will. I even thought about him when I was dealing with the marriage contract. His face would appear

met in a café. We only talked for a while. That was all. I thought it wa

a house with iron gates and guards. He was thinking about a woman with eyes and a nice smile. He was wondering if he

et. When they did I would meet Freddie Ethan again. This time it would be in a meeting. I

nt to remember every part of it. There was nothing about it but it felt special to me. We wer

ve an answer. I still do not have an answer. I just know that it felt like so