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oh well there it is, a direct dive into the plot. Hope you enjoy!


Chapter 2: Unfinished Conversations


The Notting Hill café bathed in that golden light so particular to London autumn afternoons. The oblique rays of the sun filtered through the large bay windows, drawing moving patterns on the weathered wooden tables. The smell of freshly ground coffee mingled with the cinnamon scents of scones just out of the oven, creating that cozy atmosphere that the British mastered to perfection.
Éloïse had chosen a table near the window, back to the wall -- a habit inherited from her years of protecting herself from bad surprises. Her fingers drummed nervously on the rough surface of the table, a staccato rhythm that betrayed her inner turmoil. She had ordered an Earl Grey tea that she wasn't drinking, contenting herself with stirring the spoon in the cup with mechanical precision.
Jake had gone to order, and she took advantage of it to observe him discreetly. He hadn't changed much -- still that assured gait, that way of tilting his head slightly when he talked to someone, that crooked smile that had made her lose her head at twenty-two. But something in his shoulders, an imperceptible tension, suggested that he carried a weight she didn't know.
"A cappuccino and a dark chocolate brownie," he announced, returning to sit across from her. "You remember? That was always what you ordered at Columbia."
Éloïse's heart leaped. Of course she remembered. Like she remembered his hands when he pushed a strand of her hair back, his raspy morning voice, the way he pronounced her name with that American accent that made her melt.
"My memory is excellent," she replied in a tone sharper than she would have liked. "Particularly for important details."
The implication was clear. Jake had the grace to appear uncomfortable.
"Éloïse, I..."
"No." She raised a hand to stop him. "Let's start with something simpler. What are you doing in London?"
He ran a hand through his hair, a gesture she recognized immediately. Jake always did that when he was looking for his words, when he was navigating mined territory.
"I'm working on a renovation project. An old Victorian theatre near King's Cross. The Meridian Theatre. Have you perhaps heard of it?"
She shook her head. Since their breakup, she had carefully avoided anything that could remind her of Jake, including architecture, their common passion.
"It's a listed building," he continued, his eyes lighting up despite the ambient tension. "Built in 1887, abandoned for decades. The idea is to restore its original splendor while adapting it to contemporary standards. It's exactly the kind of challenge I love."
Despite herself, Éloïse felt a hint of interest pierce her shell. She had always loved hearing him talk about his projects, that passion that lit up his face and made his voice deeper.
"For how long?" she asked, and she immediately regretted the question. This suggested that she was interested in his presence, which was exactly the impression she wanted to avoid giving.
"Six months. Maybe more if everything goes well." He paused, looking at her intently. "And you? An accountant in London, who would have thought? The last time we talked, you wanted to work in a museum."
The last time we talked. The words resonated in the air like a slap. Éloïse felt anger rising, that cold rage she had so carefully buried.
"Plans change," she said dryly. "Sometimes, you realize that romantic dreams don't pay the bills. Nor do they protect you from disappointments."
Jake flinched. Message received loud and clear.
"Éloïse, what happened in New York..."
"What?" She challenged him with her gaze, her hazel eyes sparkling with contained anger. "Do you want to tell me that you regret it? That it was a mistake? That you were wrong to treat me like shit, to say that you weren't really interested in me then disappear brutally from my life as if to confirm your words and that the six months we had spent together meant nothing?"
The words came out faster than she would have liked, charged with five years of carefully contained resentment. She had promised to stay calm, professional, detached. But being faced with him, smelling his familiar cologne, seeing those green eyes that still sometimes haunted her dreams... All her good resolutions crumbled like a house of cards.
"You don't understand," Jake murmured. "It was more complicated than that."
"Enlighten me then." Her voice had become dangerously calm, that tone she used at the office when she discovered irregularities in the accounts. "Because from my side, the facts are quite simple. We were together, we were happy -- at least that's what I thought, fool that I could be --, and then one morning you threw me away like garbage, you ran off like the bastard that you are after of course having played well with me. Frankly you deserve a prize, really. Very well played!"
Jake closed his eyes, as if her words were physically burning him.
"You were twenty-two, Éloïse. You were brilliant, ambitious, you had your whole life ahead of you. You deserved someone who... someone who could offer you the stability you needed."
"And who gave you the right to decide what I needed?" Anger was mounting now, pure and burning. "It was for me to choose, Jake. For me to decide if you were worth it or not. But you didn't even give me that chance."
He opened his mouth to answer, but she wasn't finished.
"You know what hurt me the most? It wasn't that you left me. It was that you didn't even trust me enough to tell me why. You preferred to lie to me, to make me believe that what we had together didn't matter enough to you."
"It wasn't..." Jake stopped, ran his hand through his hair again. "Damn it, Éloïse, do you think it was easy for me?"
"I don't know what it was for you," she replied. "You never told me."
A tense silence settled between them. Around them, the café life continued -- muffled conversations, tinkling of spoons against porcelain, sizzling of the espresso machine. But their bubble was hermetic, charged with everything that had never been said.
Jake finally spoke again, his voice lower, more vulnerable.
"I had my reasons, Éloïse. Good reasons. I can't... I'm not ready to talk about it now, but I'd like you to know that leaving you was the hardest thing I've ever done."
"Then why?" The question came out as a broken whisper, and she hated hearing that vulnerability in her own voice.
"Because I loved you too much to let you waste your life with me."
Time seemed to stop. Éloïse felt something crack in her chest, a familiar pain she thought she had overcome.

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