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I had meant to take her to my favorite pastry shop after dinner. I'd known happiness there once, or maybe not happiness, but the vision of it. I wanted to see whether the place had changed at all, or whether I had changed, or whether, just by sitting with her I could make up for old loves I'd gotten so close to but had never been bold enough to seize. Always got so very close, and always turned my back when the time came. Manfred and I had dessert here so many times, especially after the movies, and before Manfred, Maud and I, because it was so hot on summer nights that we'd stop to drink fizzy lemonades here, night after night, happy to be together drinking nothing stronger. And Chloe, of course, on those cold afternoons on Rivington Street so many years ago. My life, my real life, had not even happened yet, and all of this was rehearsal still. Tonight, I thought, relishing Joyce's words and feeling exquisitely sorry for myself, the time has come for me to set out on my journey westward. Then I thought of Saint Augustine's words: "Sero te amavi! Late have I loved you!
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