college romance splash awakening
“Is he going to be OK? I asked Lola on the way out.
I think so, she said. Filling ice-cube trays with faucet water.
He says he’s going back to Demarest in the spring.
Is that a good idea?
She thought about it a second. That was Lola for you. I do, she said.
You know best. I fished my keys out. So how’s the fiance?
He’s fine, she said blandly. Are you and Suriyan still together?
Killed to even hear her name. Not for a long time.
And then we stood there and starred at each other.
In a better world I would have kissed her over the ice trays and that would have been the end of all our troubles. But you know exactly what kind of world we live in. It ain’t no fucking Middle-earth. I just nodded my head, said, See you around, Lola, and drove home.”
From Junot Diaz, The Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao
