Roberto looked startled for half a second before thanking her quietly.
You noticed it immediately.
Even now, kindness surprised him.
That realization hurt in ways anger never could.
“You know,” you said carefully, “there’s something I never asked.”
He looked up.
“When you saw me that day on Cuauhtémoc Avenue… why did you try to run?”
Roberto stared at the table for a long moment.
Then he answered honestly.
“Because I loved you enough to survive losing you,” he said. “But I didn’t know if I could survive seeing pity in your eyes.”
The words settled heavily between you.
You reached for your coffee just to steady your hands.
“You never lost my love completely,” you admitted. “I just buried it under what they told me.”
Roberto nodded once, sadly.
“I know.”
“And you?”
He looked out the window toward the moving city.
“I spent a long time trying to kill mine,” he said. “It would’ve made life easier.”
Your eyes stung again.
“But you couldn’t?” you asked.
He gave a small smile.
“No. Unfortunately, I have terrible taste in impossible things.”
You laughed through tears.
The waitress brought fresh coffee without being asked. Neither of you noticed how long you had been sitting there.
Hours, maybe.
Or years.
At one point, rain began softly outside, turning the sidewalks silver. People hurried beneath awnings. The city blurred behind water-streaked glass.
Roberto watched it quietly.
“Do you ever think about who we would’ve been if none of this happened?” you asked.
He considered the question carefully.
“Sometimes,” he admitted. “But not the way I used to.”
“What changed?”
He looked at you fully then.
“I used to think losing our marriage was the greatest tragedy of my life.”
Your breath caught.
“And now?”
“Now I think the real tragedy would’ve been becoming people capable of doing what they did.”
You looked down slowly.
Because he was right.
