Chapter 14 - Sunday Without Permission|
Nearly four years after the engagement dinner, I saw Luca arguing with a vending machine.
He stood in the warehouse break room wearing a work shirt with his name stitched above the pocket.
The machine had taken his dollar and kept his crackers.
I leaned against the doorway.
“Have you tried asking politely?”
He turned, and his expression changed before he managed a smile.
“Apparently my reputation doesn't help here.”
“Probably a good sign.”
He laughed and stepped aside while I collected the donated boxes our delivery van had come to retrieve.
He had completed his prison sentence and found work scheduling shipments for a legitimate logistics company.
His old enterprises had been relinquished, illegal proceeds surrendered, and restitution arrangements remained part of his life.
The men who once waited for his orders no longer stood outside his door.
Daniel had taken an ordinary security job elsewhere.
Luca lived in an apartment close enough to walk to work when his car refused to start.
I knew these things because he told me, and because, over several months, I saw how he lived.
At first, I watched for his old impatience whenever plans changed.
If disappointment sharpened his voice, he noticed and apologized without making it my responsibility to soothe him.
I began to relax around him.
I also saw what he did when a man named Peter arrived to collect a shipment.
Peter owned a small supply business and had once paid the security fees Luca approved.
I recognized him from the community meeting years earlier.
Luca stopped sorting paperwork.
“Your order is ready,” he said.
Peter looked at him for a long moment.
“I didn't know you worked here.”
“I can ask someone else to handle your account.”
“I'd prefer that.”
Luca nodded and called his supervisor over.
He offered no explanation of his sentence or his apologies.
He did not ask Peter to shake his hand.
After the truck left, he returned to work.
That evening, he called me.
“Would you have dinner with me?”
I stood in my kitchen with a dish towel over my shoulder.
“A date?”
“Yes.”
The honest nervousness in his voice made me smile.
“Friday.”
“Where would you like to go?”
I chose a neighborhood restaurant with paper menus and windows that fogged when the kitchen got busy.
He arrived five minutes early.
So did I.
For the first few minutes, we talked too carefully about the weather, his work, and a leaking pipe at the foundation.
Then he admitted that he had practiced ordering something other than the most expensive thing on the menu.
“Why?”
“I used to think spending money made every occasion easier.”
“Did it?”
He glanced at the wobbling table.
“It prevented me from noticing what wasn't.”
We folded a sugar packet beneath the short leg together.
After that, the conversation became easier.
I told him about the disastrous first budgeting assessment.
He told me about burning pasta in a pot Teresa insisted was impossible to ruin.
We shared dessert and divided the check.
Outside, the sidewalk shone from an earlier rain.
He walked beside me without steering me toward his car.
At the corner, he asked whether he could kiss me.
I looked at the man standing under the streetlight.
I remembered the ballroom, the courtroom, and all the ordinary days since.
Then I stepped closer.
“Yes.”
The kiss was gentle and a little uncertain.
I was glad of that.
When we separated, he rested his forehead briefly against mine.
“Can I see you again?”
“Sunday,” I said.
“Your mother invited me to lunch at the community room.”
“She invited me, too.”
I smiled.
May you like
“Then try not to burn anything.”
He waited until my bus arrived, and I went home with my own keys in my hand.
