Usually, I stayed for five minutes before rushing to work.
That Tuesday morning was different.
Larry looked terrible.
His skin had a yellow tint, and his hands shook when I passed him his coffee.
I pointed at the cardboard sign.
“What is this?”
He looked down at it.
“The clinic says I probably have about a month.”
For a moment, the noise of traffic and commuters around us seemed to disappear.
“What?”
“Liver failure.”
I sat beside him on the freezing pavement.
“Larry, I’m so sorry.”
“Don’t make that face.”
“What face?”
“The face people make when they’re already standing at your funeral.”
Even then, he managed to make me laugh.
But I kept staring at the sign.
“Why marriage?”
Larry looked at his coffee.
“I don’t want to die belonging to nobody.”
“You don’t belong to nobody.”
“That’s a nice thing to say, Sarah.”
