New York smelled like rain again, the way it always did when something was about to happen.

Emily stood at the corner of 7th Avenue and 13th, umbrella half-open, watching the traffic lights change like they were deciding her fate. She had just finished another late shift at the bar, heels in her hand, exhaustion in her bones—but her heart wouldn’t sit still.  

It had been months since Jess’s wedding, months since Ryan’s last message, and yet he was everywhere. In the sound of ice hitting glass. In the quiet before laughter. In the habit of checking her phone at 11:32 p.m., the time he used to call.

She told herself she was fine. And maybe she was. Just not *finished*.

That night, the bar was nearly empty.  

She liked it that way. The kind of quiet where the neon hum sounded like company. She wiped down the counter, humming along to a song she didn’t know the lyrics to, when the door opened.  

A man walked in, shaking rain off his coat.  

“Sorry,” he said, breathless. “You guys still open?”  

“Depends,” Emily said without looking up. “You a cop, a critic, or someone who tips well?”  

He laughed—the kind of low, familiar laugh that froze her mid-motion.  

She looked up.

And there he was.  

Ryan Hale, soaked, smiling, holding the same look she remembered the night she spilled whiskey on his sleeve.  

For a second, neither of them moved. The world, obligingly, paused.  

“Hi,” he said.  

“Hi.”  

She blinked, just to make sure he was real. “You’re supposed to be in Seattle.”  

“I was,” he said. “Then I wasn’t.”  

She set down the towel. “You flew across the country for a drink?”  

“For a bartender,” he corrected.  

It was ridiculous, cinematic, and completely them.  

She poured him a whiskey—same as always—and leaned against the counter, pretending her hands weren’t shaking.  

“You look different,” he said.  

“Better or worse?”  

He smiled. “Like someone who stopped waiting for the light to change and just crossed anyway.”  

She didn’t know what to do with that. So she changed the subject. “How long are you here?”  

He hesitated. “That depends.”  

“On?”  

“Whether you tell me to leave.”  

Emily exhaled, her heartbeat misbehaving. “That’s not my best skill.”  

They talked until the lights flickered last call.  

About everything and nothing—the little things they’d missed.  

Her new apartment. His ridiculous coworkers. The plant that finally died (“may it rest in compost”).  

Somewhere in between laughter and silence, something old and familiar settled between them. The kind of comfort that only happens when someone knows all your chaos and still wants to sit in it with you.  

He reached for his glass, fingers brushing hers. Electricity. Or maybe memory.  

“I didn’t plan this,” he said quietly. “I just couldn’t stop thinking about… us. About you.”  

She wanted to answer, but words got caught between her ribs.  

So instead, she poured another drink.  

“For courage?” he asked.  

“For clarity,” she said.  

“Same thing.”  

Later, when the bar finally closed, they stepped outside. The rain had slowed, the city breathing steam and promise. He walked her home, like old times, except now every step felt heavier with everything unspoken.

When they reached her building, she turned to him.  

“So what happens now?”  

He smiled, rain in his hair, eyes soft. “I was hoping you’d tell me.”  

She crossed her arms. “That’s cheating.”  

“You never liked rules anyway.”  

“Still don’t.”  

They stood there, suspended between a past that still burned and a future that hadn’t been named.  

He said, “I don’t know where this goes. I just know it feels wrong to keep pretending I don’t care.”  

“Then don’t pretend.”  

“Is that permission?”  

“It’s an invitation.”  

He stepped closer, close enough to smell her perfume—the same kind of citrus and chaos he remembered.  

The city around them blurred into color and noise.  

When he kissed her, it wasn’t like a beginning or a return. It was both.  

The next morning, sunlight spilled across her kitchen counter.  

Ryan was making coffee, wearing one of her oversized shirts and humming off-key.  

“This is weird,” she said, leaning on the doorway.  

“Comfortably weird?”  

“Suspiciously.”  

He handed her a mug. “I could get used to it.”  

“Don’t jinx it.”  

He raised an eyebrow. “Since when are you superstitious?”  

“Since men started flying across the country unannounced.”  

He laughed. “I’ll try to schedule my romantic gestures next time.”  

“Please don’t.”  

They spent the day doing nothing monumental—walking, eating bagels, talking about ordinary things like furniture and grocery lists. It felt domestic and dangerous, like happiness pretending to be casual.  

At one point, sitting by the river, she said, “You know this doesn’t fix everything, right?”  

“I know.”  

“But it’s something.”  

“It’s us,” he said.  

And maybe that was enough.  

That night, as they watched the skyline flicker from her window, Emily thought about everything they’d been through—every near miss, every almost, every pause.  

Love, she realized, wasn’t always about certainty.  

Sometimes it was just about choosing the same person, again and again, even when you don’t have to.  

Ryan looked over, eyes soft and steady. “What?”  

She smiled. “Nothing. Just… glad you spilled that drink.”  

He grinned. “Told you gravity’s undefeated.”  

“Yeah,” she said, leaning her head against his shoulder.  

“But maybe we are too.”