Page 110 of Best I Never Had

As the slowly setting sun continues to glide across the sky, I find a small French bistro close to Lincoln Park Conservatory nestled between the park andbrick buildings. From theoutside, I can see a large display case holding various cakes and pastries. Wanting to get out of the cold and having a sudden hankering for something sweet, I walk inside.

As soon as the warmth hits me, I unwrap my scarf, suddenly feeling too stuffy. The inside is quaint. A good-sized dining room is separated from the café side where there’s a takeout counter for those that want to order from the bakery. When I get a closer look at the display case, I already know I’m going to have trouble deciding what I want with too many choices of fruit tarts, brownies, and flavors of cakes, all of which I want to sample at least once.

“Are you ready to order?” a soft voice asks as I continue my ogling. I look up at the cashier, a brunette woman with a black apron, her name, Janet, neatly embroidered across her chest.

“Um,” I answer. “What do you suggest?”

She smiles wider, her eyes lighting up with kindness. “One of our pastry chefs makes the best vanilla cake. It has a rich strawberry cream cheese frosting, and it is actually heaven in your mouth.”

I giggle. “I’ll have that. And a cinnamon latte, please.”

“Sure,” she answers.

After a quick transaction and I’m handed my order, I settle into a stool along a long bar-like table facing out toward the street. I drape my scarf over the back of the stool before opening up the small to-go container holding my slice of heaven. When I take the first bite into the spongy cake, I’m hit with a sudden wave of nostalgia. I don’t know how, but this cake…it tastes like home. Like bustling classrooms filled with clinking petri dishes and complicated lab assignments. Or a busy parking lot scattered with farewells and unspoken words.

Janet wasn’t wrong when she said the cake was like heaven in your mouth. I finish the entire cake, taking small sips of warm cinnamon latte in between bites. As I’m clearing my trash, my phone buzzes in my purse.

“Hello?”

“Natalia,” Matteo calls from the other line. “I’m heading back to the hotel. Are you there?”

“I’m on the other side, near the conservatory. Is your meeting over?”

“Yes and no,” he answers. “The investors just wanted to do a meet and greet before they check into their hotel. I think it’s their way of trying to catch us off guard. But that means I’ll be able to make it for our reservations.”

I smile, already walking out the door and ready to make the trek back to our hotel. “I’ll see you back in our room.”

present

The next month passes by without so much as a hiccup. I fall into a routine at work as the weather gradually shifts from the breezy fall to the biting cold that comes with the December chill. Everywhere I look, I see the holidays are gradually approaching, from the storefront windows covered in Christmas decorations to holiday music filtering through every place that has a sound system.

I’ve been spending the last couple of weeks gradually moving on from whatever rejection I suffered this past year. From Matteo, from Hayden, from every thought that passed through my hopeful heart thinking I was destined for something more. Instead, I bury myself in work. I spend my lunch hours inside my office, opting to have food ordered in instead of dining out. And while I repeatedly tell José that it’s to avoid the chilly weatheroutside, in all honesty, it’s to avoid the lingering thoughts of Hayden just a few blocks away. Probably busy, filling his time with work just as I am, while letting go of something that could have blossomed between us. Something that could have grown if sheltered and valued.

I briefly fill José in on the relationship that didn’t happen between myself and Hayden, something he already assumed. When I appear more heartbroken than before, his persistence to mend my broken heart grows tenfold, and he urges me to call Shawn back after our failed first date.

I spent this past week preparing to travel back home for Christmas. It’s the last few days in the office until the new year, and I’m finishing Christmas shopping while packing for my extended vacation. Another plus to this vacation home is that Carmen will be joining us, unlike last year, with David in tow. It’ll be the first time David is meeting our parents in the three years that they’ve been dating, and he’s been a ball of nerves ever since we booked our tickets.

Tonight, it’s the night before Christmas Eve, Christmas Eve-Eve as Lucy puts it, and I have a holiday work party that I’m attending before taking an afternoon flight the following day while Carmen and David are to fly out on Christmas morning once she gets off work.

Dressed in a simple green dress the color of deep emeralds, all topped with my hair in loose, wavy curls swept to one side and a dark, maroon-colored lipstick, I scan the large banquet room in the fancy hotel that feels too formal for it to be considered a party and more like an extended workday instead.

“Have you tried the scallops?” José asks in hushed excitement, approaching me with a small appetizer plate full of said scallops. “They’re to die for.”

I peek at his plate, where a small pile of the pan seared scallops, drizzling in a savory smelling oil, sits, waiting for me to have a sample. I pluck onefrom the plate and pop it in my mouth, and it practically melts off my tongue.

“They also have some sliders that have applewood smoked bacon in them,” he says through a full mouth. “So don’t get too full off of these.”

I nod, agreeing with him as I reach for a second scallop.

“Mmm!” he exclaims, waving at someone behind me. I turn and see Shawn walking our way with an easy smile. I flip around to face José again.

“What is he doing here?” I hiss.

“I invited him,” he answers almost too nonchalantly. As if I don’t know the tricks he has up his sleeve. “Just make nice and have a small chat.”

I have enough time to roll my eyes at José with a hint of annoyance before greeting Shawn with a smile as he approaches us.

“Hey, cuz!” José greets Shawn.

---