“I think about that day a lot,” he said. “I should have zipped it for you. I should have told you to stay.”

We didn’t say anything for a long time after that. It was just the sound of two old people breathing on opposite ends of a phone line, five miles apart.

I thought about all the Sunday dinners I had alone. I thought about all the school plays and graduations where we sat on opposite sides of the auditorium, pretending the other person didn’t exist.

All that wasted time just because we were both too proud to say we were sorry.

“Diane?” he said.

“Yes, Richard?”

“The lake is nice in the morning,” he said. “The mist comes off the water around seven.”

I looked down at my hands. They were spotted with age now.

We weren’t those young, angry kids anymore. We were just two old people running out of road.

“I’ll be there,” I said. “But you’re buying the coffee.”

“I can do that,” he said.

We hung up after that. I sat in the dark for a little while longer, just watching the headlights of a car pass by my window.

I don’t know what is going to happen tomorrow morning when I see him. I don’t know if we can ever fix what we broke.

But I know I am going to set my alarm for six o’clock. And for the first time in fifteen years, I don’t feel angry anymore.