Page 58 of Modern Romance September 2025 5-8
He is so nice. “I would. Thank you. I’m… Going a little bit crazy cooped up in my apartment all day.”
“Same. Anything I can do to help out a fellow American.”
“Cue eagle screech,” I say.
“I’m not going to do it. Everyone in here already hates us.”
“True,” I say.
I want to tell him that my soon-to-be ex-husband is Romanian, and do an impersonation of Dragos’s grim voice as he monologues about large American chain stores and consumerism. Because it’s something I always found funny, because he’s a billionaire, so…whatever with the consumerism rant and also he married an American.
But I stop myself, because I don’t actually want to think about Dragos. And I don’t want to talk about him. I’m angry that I had a good memory of him. A thing that I used to find amusing.
“Are you all right, Cassie?” he asks.
I told him to call me Cassie. That’s what everyone calls me back home. It’s really only Dragos that insists on Cassandra. “Yes. Everything’s fine. I’ll… I’ll see you tonight. I just live upstairs? But we can meet down here in front of the café.”
“Great. Seven o’clock?”
“Perfect.”
He leaves to go to work, and I stay seated for a minute. I feel just a little bit lighter. Just a little bit happier. I feel like maybe everything isn’t ruined.
I’m not attracted to him. But I’ve met someone. Someone nice. Someone I can have a conversation with. After feeling like I was descending into madness for so long, it’s a relief. Of course, spending the rest of the day working on my painting of Dragos pulls me back into a strange place. And by the time I’m on the street waiting for Luke I’m feeling edgy.
The streets are busy, but still, there is movement that catches my eye, and I look quickly. I’m sure that I see a man with black hair, wearing a black coat slip around the corner.
My nerves rattle.
Dragos.
No. It can’t be. It can’t be Dragos. I tell myself that repeatedly. But I become more and more anxious until Luke arrives with a small bunch of roses. “I know,” he says. “But, I wanted to get them for you.”
“That’s very nice,” I say.
Of course then I have to carry them for the whole evening, because I’m not about to invite him up to my apartment before we even eat. I’m not about to invite him up at all, not under any circumstances.
I couldn’t even imagine.
Please come in, ignore all of the paintings of my naked ex-husband.
Yes, I am extremely horny, but not for you, for his jawline.
I wince. Thankfully, Luke doesn’t notice.
The restaurant he chooses for dinner is lovely, modern. We are seated by the window. I’m a glass of wine deep in the conversation when the hair on my arm prickles. I look out the window, and I see him. Standing there across the street, his hands in his pockets. Looking right at me.
My jaw drops, my heart begins to race. A bus drives by, obscuring my view. And after it passes, he’s gone.
“What is it?”
“I… I don’t…”
“You look scared,” he says.
“I’m not. I… I…” I shake my head. “I thought I saw someone I know. But they can’t be here. They aren’t in the country. It was just one of those uncanny things.” I try to smile. “I’ll slow down on the wine.”
I try to calm myself down, and soon I find myself relaxing. Dinner is lovely. I learned more about Luke over the course of that dinner than I ever did about Dragos in the four years we were married. And I still don’t want to see him naked. It’s too soon. That’s the thing.
