“Hey, Mattie.”
Sarah snaps her fingers. “Matthew Cole,” she whispers.
Matt slips off his shades. “Logan?”
I raise my hands. “In the flesh.”
“What—what the hell?” He stares at me so hard that I’m not sure he believes what he’s seeing.
He looks good. He’s built out a little more. Must be for the last role he had in Fish Mate as that detective. I tried to distance myself from him. Not to look him up or follow him along in the news. It still hurt, no matter how much healing I’d done, the way things ended between us. But I was excited for him. I really was. A fucking Oscar?
“It’s good to see you.”
“What’re you doing here?” he says. “How long have you been in New York?”
“A few months,” I say. He looks shocked and amazed and maybe a little angry.
Sarah makes an oh sound, and I know another piece of information has clicked into place for her: this is a reunion between two ex-boyfriends. “Logan, why don’t you take your break early?” she says.
I look at Mattie. “Do you want to get a coffee with me? Catch up?”
He bites his lip. I feel a twinge of warmth. It’s the little things you don’t even realize you miss. “I’ve got—shit, I’ve got a meeting downtown.”
“Okay. That’s okay.”
“A stage production.”
“Yeah?”
He hesitates. “You know what? I’ll—yeah, I’ll let them know I’m running late.”
“You don’t have to do that, Matt.”
“I’m a little scared you’ll disappear again if I don’t talk to you now.”
That’s fair. That used to be the sort of thing I would do. I wouldn’t answer his calls or texts. I left LA without any warning. I didn’t tell anyone where I went except for my father. I threw away my phone once I arrived at the center.
“I won’t disappear,” I tell him. “I promise. I still need this job.”
Sarah snorts.
“My shift ends at four.”
“My meeting’s done at five.”
“I’ll wait at the park across the street,” I say. “Or I could come down and meet you.”
“I’ll—uh, I’ll come back here. The park you said?”
I point through the window. “Yeah. Right across the street.”
From the worry in his eyes, I can tell he still doesn’t trust me. But that’s been a part of the healing process, too. Learning about responsibility and accountability. Having the courage to own up to mistakes and apologize and make change. I owe Mattie an apology for everything that went down. Yeah, I had my trauma. But that didn’t mean I should have hurt him the way I did, over and over again.
“All right,” he says. “I’ll meet you then.”
Anxiety builds throughout the day. A few years ago, I would’ve pushed it all away. I would’ve tried to numb the emotions. Alcohol, drugs, sex—anything to not feel. Instead, now, I ask Sarah for a break. I sit in the back room. Eyes closed, I breathe. I let anxiety ripple through me. “Honor your emotions,” Amy always said.
Acknowledging the anxiety helps. I remember it’s a sensation that will pass. That the anxiety isn’t my body. It isn’t me. It eventually fades the deeper I breathe. I take one last breath and open my eyes. Sarah looks up at me from the register when I swing open the back room’s door. “Better?” she asks.
“Yeah. Better.”
*
When my shift is over, I stick around an extra hour at a table in the back. I pull my laptop out of my bag and start writing. I wouldn’t say that screenwriting is my new dream. It isn’t my only goal in life. But it’s something to focus on. Something that lets me use my creativity. I usually write in the evenings. I read other screenplays, since I still have a hard time watching TV and films. I take walks on the days I have off from the coffee shop. I sit in the park and just—I don’t know. Breathe. Watch the world turn. It’s been good. Life has been good.
Five o’clock comes around, so I pack my laptop into my bag and head across the street to the park. Nervousness buzzes through me. It’s been a few years since the last time I had a real conversation with Mattie. I wonder how he’s changed. I sure as hell know I’m a different person.
I don’t have any expectations. I only have one goal. Apologize. Acknowledge that I fucked up. Let him know, maybe, that I’m doing a lot better now. And I want to thank him. I really do. Everything in my life changed because of him. Even if we weren’t good for each other, he was the catalyst for me realizing I was trapped in a cycle—for helping me see there were other ways to live.
I wait on the bench by the park’s entrance and watch people walk by, some with their dogs on leashes. Someone rides their bike. A kid runs past with a laugh, looking back at their parent. Mattie walks up to me, shoes crunching on the gravel. He used to wear yellow sneakers, but he’s in a pair of scuffed brown boots now. They go a little more with the style of the movie that got him the Oscar.
“You look good, Matt,” I say when he sits down beside me.
He watches me closely, his brown eyes soft with…suspicion? Skepticism? Surprise, maybe, that I’m really here.
“You do, too,” he finally says. “Logan—God, what happened to you?”
I take a deep breath. “A lot. The story’s kind of long.”
“I don’t mind. I’ve got the time.”
I tell him everything. That I broke off contact with my father and went to La Jolla and checked myself into the clinic and started intensive therapy with one-on-one and group sessions, was introduced to meditation and learned about trauma.
“There’s a lot of scientific shit that goes into it,” I say, crossing one leg over the other. “A lot of neuroscience and studies about rewiring the brain and…I don’t know, I spent months reading about it nonstop. There were a lot of days before the clinic where I was afraid it was impossible for me to change, but while I was there, I felt like I’d been given a second shot at life.”
Mattie’s near tears. Some things don’t change.
“I’m really happy for you,” he tells me. “I was scared you had hurt yourself, or…I don’t know.”
“Yeah.” I don’t need to tell him how close I was to doing just that when I first got to La Jolla. “I was at the clinic for about a year and a half before I began to travel.” I went across the states for a couple of months, then to Europe. I didn’t even do anything, really, except walk around small villages and towns, getting used to feeling safe in my body. Figuring out what felt good, what little pleasures I enjoyed. After I visited my mom in Florida, I decided to try New York. “Got a job in the coffee shop by chance. I liked the name. Coffee Unlimited. Reminded me of the days of unlimited coffee on set.”
He laughs. “Jesus, that’s the same reason I came in.”
“No shit, really?”
“That’s an incredible story,” he says. “It was brave of you. I mean, going to the clinic and everything…It’s admirable.”