To the one I loved the most

A little slice out of a piece I'm writing...enjoy.
***

A week later, she received a phone call from a number she didn’t recognize. Later, she listened to the message. It was Jack. He was home from having been abroad and wanted to meet up with her, having heard through mutual friends that she was about to marry. She listened to the message twice and then carefully lay herself down on the bed as if her bones were sore and stayed there until the daylight had faded.

She called him back. She ignored the vibrations around her heart when she heard his voice, though after she hung up, she felt as though she were moving about under water. They had agreed to meet for lunch at a place they used to love, a restaurant on the pier that stuck out over the water and gave one the impression of being out at sea. Sophie had not been there since she had left him and wondered if that had been a wise move since it wasn’t neutral territory. She didn’t tell Chase. It was, after all, only a meal.

They hugged, briefly. She didn’t look into his eyes but busied herself with the business of putting down her purse, taking off her jacket, spreading the napkin onto her lap, first lengthwise and then the other way. He set a carefully wrapped gift in front of her. She opened it and looked up at him, astonished. Something rose up between them. The awkwardness was not yet gone, but for a moment, they could not move.

“I picked that up in Paris for you. I remembered that you had always been on the hunt for a first edition. It was in a little shop near my flat.”
“Thank you,” she said quietly. “I’m surprised you remembered.”
“I remember a lot of things,” he said, playing with the salt and pepper shaker.
They ordered. A bottle of wine appeared.
“You look good,” he said. “Thinner.”
“Thanks. I am good,” she said, annoyed for some reason.
“Really?”
“Sure.” She ran her finger around the rim of her glass. “I’m getting married. My book is finally being published. I have everything I want.” She hadn’t intended for the sarcastic edge to creep into her voice.
“I don’t believe you.”
“Please,” she said, her glance flitting around the table. “Jack.” She rested her forehead in her left hand, her fingers spreading through her hair.
“What do you want me to say?”
“I don’t know. I just hoped – “
“What? That I’d pretend not to be able to read you?”
“I guess,” she whispered. Sophie looked outside. It was an unseasonably grey day and everything seemed bruised.
Jack took a deep breath. “Listen, Soph. I’m sorry. It’s just still hard to see you. I don’t understand what happened. One minute you were there and everything was fine and then suddenly you left.”
“Everything was not fine.”
“Ok, but you’re still the one who left.”
“Do you want us to go over this again? The why’s – ?”
“No,” he said. Around them at other tables people were having pleasant, chatty lunches. He shook his head. “I still don’t get it, though.”
“You didn’t want me,” Sophie said.
“God. That’s not true. You just wanted, expected too much. You know? I don’t think I ever stood a chance at understanding you.”
“I don’t think you ever tried.”
The woman at the table next to them dropped her fork and Jack leaned down to pick it up and give it back to her. The distraction was a relief. Sophie looked out over the white tips of the breaking waves.
“God, this wine tastes like shit. Does yours taste off?” He waved for the waitress, a beautiful girl who Jack turned to with his smile, that smile. Sophie didn’t hear what he was saying, but thought back to when things had finally fallen apart between them. He had drifted away, like a fog really. He had been so persistent when seeking her attention and then it just faded despite his insistence that he still wanted to be with her, though she felt him looking over her shoulder whenever she was in his arms.

He turned the conversation to other things but Sophie had retreated into her own head, realizing that by leaving him, she had spared herself the pain that went along with allowing herself to be so vulnerable. His voice, with its forced gaiety, revealed a crucial space between them, a gap that comforted Sophie. She couldn’t, wouldn’t be harmed.

They embraced upon parting. He held her for too long and she was folded into his familiar scent; it paralyzed her for a moment, but she was able to pull away before it became dangerous. Something had hardened inside of her over their entrees and he noticed the shift. He looked at her for a while with a pained expression and said, “I’ll call you when I’m in town next.”
“No,” she said, wrinkling her nose so as to appear aloof. “I don’t think it’s a good idea.” She felt safe behind her sunglasses, as if behind a steel mask.
He didn't ask why. The wind blew down upon them and he reached out to touch her cheek. She didn’t move, willed herself not to.
“Bye, Soph,” he said, and walked away along the boardwalk, the mist licking off the water, giving the impression that he was fading from her view.

She watched his retreating back until he disappeared, and then exhaled heavily, not having been aware that she was holding her breath. She looked down at the book in her hands and opened the cover. His familiar, loopy handwriting danced across a sheet paper that he had slipped between the first pages. To the one I loved the most, it said. Sophie shut the book quickly. She had the distinct impression that someone was shoving broken glass deeply into her heart.