Mar 22, 2019
When Strangers Meet
Extract: I decided to be honest since he’s just witnessed the flurry on the phone. “I’m a little frazzled,” I tell him. “How are you?”
“I’m fine, thanks,” he says, and looks out the window.
I wait until his attention strays back to me. “Would you have told me if you weren’t?”
He’s confused. “I’m fine,” he says again, smiling.
“I know, but if you weren’t fine, would you have told me that?”
He laughs at me. It’s a laugh I’ve heard before, the one he reserves for the florid and broken halfway-house residents from around the corner who count out their pennies for coffee. “Of course not,” he says, still smiling. “I wouldn’t tell you that.”
