Rain on the Threshold

 

The first time I saw her, it was in a late café where the windows kept catching passing headlights like soft, restless moons. She asked if the seat across from me was taken, and her voice carried that careful confidence people wear when they’re still deciding whether to be brave.

We spoke the way strangers do when they sense the edge of something—names exchanged like small offerings, laughter arriving too easily. She had a habit of brushing sugar from her thumb, a slow, absent gesture that felt intimate only because I noticed it. When she leaned closer to hear me over the espresso machine’s hiss, the warmth of her perfume folded into my breathing. Not a promise. Just a detail that made my chest tighten.

Outside, rain started without commitment. Under the awning, she stood beside me, shoulder nearly touching mine, our conversation tapering into pauses that weren’t awkward—just full. The streetlight painted her cheekbone in amber. She looked at me as if I were familiar, as if she could already guess how I’d ask for more.

“Walk with me,” she said, and I did.

Two blocks later, her phone buzzed. The glow shifted her expression—something flickering behind her eyes, a door quietly closing. She smiled, but it didn’t reach all the way.

“I’m so sorry,” she murmured, already stepping back. “I have to go.”

I waited for her to add something—an explanation, a next time, even a lie we could both accept. Instead, she turned the corner and vanished into the rain as if she’d never been there at all.

I stood under the awning long after my clothes dampened, realizing how quickly hope can form—how easily it can be left behind, still warm, still reaching.