Nothing Left to Say
The hug lasted exactly the right amount of time, which was how Jamie knew something was off.
They slid into opposite sides of the same booth they'd had last year and the year before that. The leather was cracked in a new place near Jamie's left hip. The fake candle in the center of the table flickered on a timer, steady as a metronome.
Morgan shrugged off their jacket and draped it over the booth like they were settling in for a long stay.
You too. Did you do something with your—
No.
Right. No, it looks the same. Good same.
Jamie picked up the menu. Same laminated two-pager, same wine stain ghost in the upper corner. They'd both memorized it years ago but held it anyway.
Morgan flipped a page they didn't need to flip.
It's fine. Busy. They moved me to a different floor, so that's been an adjustment. New coffee machine up there is terrible.
That matters though. Bad coffee can ruin a whole—
Yeah.
The topic died on the table between them. Morgan turned their water glass a quarter rotation. Jamie looked at the fake candle, then away.
A server appeared — mid-twenties, dark hair pulled tight, the kind of aggressive friendliness that suggested she was three hours into a double.
Both of them turned to her at the same time.
Uh — yeah. Glass of the Montepulciano?
Jamie almost said water, which is what they actually wanted.
Tessa scribbled and smiled and left, and the booth got quiet again. Someone laughed three tables over. A plate got set down too hard in the kitchen.
Morgan set down the menu and leaned back.
And you ordered a martini because you thought that's what adults drank.
I didn't even know what was in it. I just knew the word.
They both laughed. It was real for about two seconds, and then it kept going a beat too long, and then it stopped.
Jamie's phone buzzed in their pocket. They didn't reach for it.
Morgan picked at the edge of the menu where the lamination was peeling.
Not really. Devin's in Portland, I think. Or was.
Huh.
Morgan's thumb found the peeling lamination again and worked at it.
Should we get the calamari? We always get the calamari.
Morgan smiled, and it was the first thing all night that looked like it cost them something.
Jamie took a sip of the Montepulciano. It was fine. They'd wanted water.
Morgan was looking at something over Jamie's shoulder — the bar, maybe, or the front door. Jamie tried to think of what to say next. Work was used up. The apartment was the apartment. There was the thing with their mom, but that sat in Jamie's chest like a stone they couldn't figure out how to lift onto the table.
Jamie set their menu down too quickly, the laminate slapping the table.
Jamie. We've eaten here a hundred times.
Yeah, no, I know. I just — maybe there's something new.
Morgan looked at them for a second longer than the moment required. Then they flagged Tessa down with a small wave.
Tessa materialized with her notepad already out.
We were wondering if there's anything new on the menu. Any specials or whatever.
Tessa's pen tapped against the pad.
The ravioli sounds good.
Yeah, me too. And the calamari to start.
Tessa collected the menus. Jamie watched them go.
Without the menus, the table was just a table. Two glasses of wine, the fake candle, a bread plate with nothing on it yet. Jamie's hands didn't know where to go.
So I started doing pottery.
Wait, really?
Yeah. There's a studio near my place. Wednesday nights. It's — I don't know. It's something to do with my hands.
Jamie nodded. Pottery. Morgan did pottery now. On Wednesdays. Jamie had no idea when that started or what had made Morgan walk into a studio for the first time or whether they were any good.
Hand-building, mostly. I made a mug. It's not great. The handle's kind of—
Morgan mimed a crooked handle and almost smiled. Jamie almost smiled back. Both of them stopped just short of the real thing.
Somewhere in the restaurant, a woman laughed — big and unselfconscious, the kind that carried.
Morgan's thumb found the edge of a cocktail napkin and started working at the corner.
They both knew that wasn't going to happen. Not because of cruelty or distance but because it would require Morgan to think of Jamie on a Wednesday, in a studio, surrounded by people Jamie had never met, and to carry a mug home and wrap it and find an address and mail it. And that was a lot of steps for two people who saw each other once a year and texted on birthdays.
How's everything else? You doing okay?
Morgan stopped picking at the napkin.
Jamie's phone buzzed again in their pocket. They pressed their thigh against it to muffle the vibration and kept their eyes on Morgan, who was looking at the fake candle now.
Jamie turned the wine glass by its stem.
Are you seeing anyone?
Morgan's hand stopped on the napkin.
I was, actually. For a bit. It ended in — October, I think? Yeah. October.
Four months ago. Jamie hadn't known. Hadn't been told, hadn't asked, hadn't been the person Morgan called when it started or when it ended.
You could've told me.
Yeah.
Morgan pulled a piece off the end of the bread loaf. Held it. Didn't eat it.
We used to tell each other everything.
Morgan was looking at the bread plate.
Jamie opened their mouth. Closed it. Tried again.
The past tense just sat there between them.
Tessa appeared with the bread basket, setting it down between them.
I'm good.
Yeah. We're good.
Tessa moved on.
Morgan set the torn bread down on the plate.
The calamari hadn't come yet. Jamie could hear the couple in the next booth talking about someone's sister, their voices easy and overlapping, and the sound of people who actually had things to say to each other made Jamie's throat tighten.
Morgan's fingers were on the edge of the bread plate. Just resting there.
I miss you.
Morgan looked up.
I know you're right there. I know that's a stupid thing to say to someone who's sitting three feet away from you. But I miss you.
Jamie's palms were flat on the table.
Morgan didn't say anything for a long time. Their hands moved to their lap, both of them, below the table.
I almost didn't come tonight.
Jamie nodded.
I almost cancelled. Twice.
What stopped you?
I don't know. The reservation, I guess. Felt like if I cancelled this one I wouldn't make the next one.
Jamie picked up the wine. Put it back down without drinking.
Would that have been the worst thing?
Morgan's jaw tightened and then loosened and they looked at the ceiling for a second.
Yeah. It would have.
I don't know how to do this anymore, Jamie. I don't know what we talk about. I've been sitting here for forty minutes trying to — and I've got nothing. But the idea of just not doing it makes me want to throw up.
Tessa materialized at the edge of the booth with a plate in each hand and a calamari balanced on her forearm.
She looked at Morgan's face.
I'll check back in a bit.
She set the calamari down and left fast. The plate sat there, golden and steaming, between two people who weren't looking at it.
I don't know how to do it either.
So what do we do?
Jamie reached for a piece of calamari and held it between their fingers. It was too hot.
Morgan let out a breath that was almost a laugh.
You didn't know about the relationship. You didn't know about pottery. You don't know my roommate's name. You don't even know about my mom.
Jamie went still.
What about your mom?
Morgan picked up the bread. Tore it. Put both halves back.
See? That's — that's the whole thing, right there.
The calamari was cooling between them.
I don't want to do this once a year anymore.
Morgan flinched.
No. That's not what I mean.
Jamie pulled their hands off the table and pressed them against their own knees, hard, like they were trying to hold themselves in place.
I'm saying call me. About your mom. About the shitty thing that happened in October. Call me about nothing. I don't care.
Morgan's mouth opened and closed.
You say that now.
Yeah. I do.
Morgan looked down at the table. Then back up.
My mom had a scare. In November. She's fine now, but it was — for about two weeks it wasn't clear if she was going to be fine.
Jamie didn't move.
I would have come.
Morgan looked at them for a long time.
Then why.
Because I'd have had to explain everything that came before it. All the context you didn't have. And I didn't have the energy to catch you up on my life so you could be there for the crisis part.
That one landed. Jamie sat with it.
So give me the context. Not right now — I mean going forward. I don't want the highlights reel at Carrino's once a year. I want the boring Wednesday stuff.
The boring Wednesday stuff.
Yeah.
Morgan picked up a piece of calamari with their fingers. Ate it. Chewed slowly.
What?
My roommate. Her name's Dana. She leaves hair in the drain and eats my yogurt and she's the one who drove me to the hospital when Mom called.
Jamie nodded. Dana.
Tessa appeared at the edge of the booth with two plates balanced on her forearm. She set the ravioli down, one plate, then the other. There was a smear of sauce on the rim of Jamie's plate.
We're okay.
Tessa left.
Morgan picked up a fork. Jamie picked up a fork. They ate. The ravioli was good. Morgan started talking — about Dana's cat, about the kiln at the studio that keeps overheating, about the doctor who'd been blunt with her mom in a way that was awful and then later felt like a kindness. Jamie ate and listened. Asked a question. Asked another one.
The restaurant was getting louder around them. A busboy dropped a bin of silverware somewhere near the kitchen and the crash made them both flinch and then laugh, and the laugh was nothing, just a reflex.
The ravioli plates were mostly scraped clean, smeared with sauce neither of them had mopped up yet. Jamie set their fork down.
What did the doctor say? About your mom.
Morgan pushed a piece of ravioli around with her fork, then stopped.
He was kind of a dick, honestly. Very clinical. Laid it all out like he was reading a grocery list. Percentages, timelines. She was sitting right there.
Jesus.
Yeah. But then — I don't know. A week later she told me she was glad he didn't sugarcoat it. Said she'd rather know what she was dealing with than have someone pat her hand.
Morgan's fingers were on the table.
She asks about you, by the way. Every time I call. 'How's Jamie, what's Jamie up to.' I never know what to tell her.
That one sat in Jamie's chest for a while.
Tell her I'm good. Or — actually, give me her number. I'll tell her myself.
You're serious.
Yeah.
Morgan looked at Jamie for a long time. Then she pulled out her phone and read the number off the screen. Jamie typed it in, slow, one digit at a time.
She'll talk your ear off. Fair warning.
Good.
Tessa passed the booth carrying a tray of desserts to another table. She glanced over and kept going.
Morgan ate a piece of bread.
Wednesday.
What about it.
The studio's open seven to ten. You don't have to make anything. You could just come sit there and drink the terrible coffee and watch me fight with the kiln.
Jamie's phone sat face-up on the table. Two missed texts glowed on the lock screen. Jamie left it there.
This Wednesday?
If you want.
Yeah. I want.
Morgan leaned back against the booth.
Okay.
The restaurant was thinning out around them, busboys clearing tables, the kitchen sounds winding down. They split the check. Morgan left cash and Jamie covered the rest on a card and they argued about the tip for thirty seconds in a way that felt like the first normal thing either of them had done all night.
They stood in the parking lot with their keys out. The air was cold and smelled like the dumpster behind the kitchen and someone's cigarette.
Wednesday.
Wednesday.
The hug lasted too long and not long enough and neither of them tried to get it exactly right.
Morgan walked to her car. Jamie watched her go — the way she dug for keys without looking, the way her jacket was zipped wrong, one side hanging lower than the other.
Morgan stopped halfway across the lot and turned around.
Yeah. Okay.
Morgan's car started on the second try. The headlights swept across the front of the building and then she was pulling out, one hand raised through the driver's side window without turning around. Jamie raised a hand back.
Jamie stood there for a minute. The cold was real now. They pulled out their phone, scrolled past the two cleared notifications to the new contact — Morgan's Mom — sitting at the bottom of the list. They locked the screen.
Inside, through the window, Tessa was wiping down their booth. She stacked the plates, tucked the check folder under her arm, and blew out the fake candle out of habit. It kept pulsing.
Jamie got in the car. The seat was cold. They sat with the engine running and typed: Got home safe. Then deleted it. They hadn't gotten home yet.
They pulled out of the lot. The Carrino's sign buzzed on its pole, half the letters dimmer than the others where the bulbs were going.