The Lesson

All Evening

Loring sat with a cup of tea and her head in her hands, drinking in this one thing: her eyes sidelong seeing the boy rocking, with knit cap and brown quilted coat. It was so nearly there. She could so nearly feel Ezra’s life in the boy. But it flickered. It was there and gone. A lilt to a particular vowel, an angle to the face. She counted on her hands all the things she longed for, and there was simply one. One thing — to have the freshness of that first encounter once again when she had seen him in the boy.

— I will see you again, she said to herself. I know I will.