As the early evening sun warms my face, he turns to me. “So, you want to know what to do next with Ruby?”
“Yes. Yes, I do. Was it always perfect with Theresa? You must have hit a rough patch at some point, right?”
He laughs, but it’s not at me—it’s with me. “No, Jesse. I am the only man in the history of the world who has never pissed off his wife.”
“Lucky bastard,” I mutter.
“Of course we hit rough patches. In the early days, her grandmother wasn’t thrilled about her dating a guy who wasn’t Korean, and Theresa refused to get engaged without her halmoni’s permission. We bickered about that for a few months before Grandma finally got on board. And we struggled when we were trying to get pregnant too. Theresa was emotional and depressed, and so was I. Neither one of us knew what to say to the other for a while. Hard patches are hard. But they’re also normal.”
“So what do you do?”
“Talk it out,” he says. “But . . .”
“But what?” I ask, agitation whipping through me. I have a feeling he’s going to say talking won’t work for me.
“I’m not sure that’ll work for you.”
Yup. Sometimes, knowing your friends this well sucks. “And why’s that? Why can’t I talk to her? Or, I don’t know, show up on her doorstep with ten thousand flowers? Or hold a boombox over my head outside her window?”
But even as I list all those options, they sound wrong.
So un-Ruby.
Max arches a brow. “You don’t have to throw a parade or buy out a flower shop for her. There’s a place for the grand gesture, but this isn’t it.”
My shoulders sag.
“Hate to break it to you,” he adds with a sigh, “but sometimes you just have to bide your time. Give your woman space. I think that’s what has to happen here, bro.”
I grit my teeth and clench my jaw as we stop at the light. “I’m in love with her, Max. And I fucked it up. But this can’t be the end. I want to prove to her that I can be what she needs.”
“But you already said your piece. You explained why you did what you did. You apologized. And she said she needed space. Judging from the times I’ve met her, Ruby seems like a straightforward, honest person. I don’t think she said that so you’d do the opposite, Jesse. I think she said it because she actually needs space.”
I hate this advice.
I hate that I can’t solve this problem by doing something. Can’t fix it with a wrench, or a new set of tires.
All I can do is wait, and that’s not in my nature. “How the hell am I just supposed to . . . sit here? Doing nothing?”
Max is quiet for a beat. “Isn’t that what you did with the list?”
The words cut me to the core with their unadulterated truth.
He’s dead right. I waited with the list.
I waited two long years. I waited until she was ready.
Maybe that’s exactly what I should be doing now.
But first I have to talk to her, one more time. I have to let her know that I’ll wait for her as long as she needs me to.
I'm totally willing to do that.
I want to do that. If she wants me to.
Because she’s absolutely worth waiting for.
I say goodbye to Max, take off around the block, pop into a corner store, and grab a sheet of paper, an envelope, and a pencil.