And they sat there, two people who had loved before and lost before, who had learned that romance is not a beginning but a continuation—a quiet, defiant act of showing up, even when you know how it ends.

Elena laughed. It was a real laugh, not the polite one she used with her book club or the brisk one she used with her real estate clients. “They’re dramatic,” she said. “It’s not you. It’s the plant.”

Paul sat down on her couch. He patted the cushion next to him. “I know a guy,” he said, “who charters a train down the coast. It’s slow. It’s ridiculous. You have to share a bathroom with strangers. But you see the ocean for six hours.”

Paul nodded. He was quiet for a moment. “Linda used to say that marriage is just a long series of ‘I’ll get it this time’ and ‘you were right.’ We were married thirty-eight years. I got it wrong about three thousand times. She kept score, but she kept it to herself.”

“That’s not what I said.”

“I make a decent cobbler,” she said. “But I’m not making it for a stranger. You’d have to come over and help. And you’d have to bring the bourbon.”

“That’s not Paris.”