Louisa watched an excess of romance movies. Too many to count. Good for the soul or for dodging reality from her history of failed relationships. The time had arrived to face her strengths and foibbles. Travel was the elixir. She carved out a long weekend, packed her car and headed north of Boston with a stop to visit her mother and then three days in Maine where she could clear her head, and find the optimistic Louisa gone missing.

She stopped in New Hampshire at a local diner to pick up a chocolate frappe and a cinnamon roll for her mom. Two favorites from the days Louisa waited tables in high school. Despite the passing of twenty years, the town diner hadn’t changed much. Loyal patrons sat in their favorite booths or on vinyl topped stools. So many memories flooded her mind. She shook off a deja vu feeling, placed her order and perched on a stool to people watch. A few customers entered the restaurant allowing a bell to ring announcing their arrival. A tall man in a suit with a newspaper tucked under one arm moved with a casual grace in her direction.

“Lou?” he said.

The forgotten term of endearment took her by surprise. The man smiled, a lopsided grin she remembered. A conversation, so familiar, it seemed they had stepped away for a minute and then returned. The two were divorced. How does that happen? Coincidence? Who believes in such stuff? Forgotten, or buried, was the chemistry between them.

“Where are you headed?” he asked.

“York Beach Inn,” she said.

“Just across the street from the Inn is a pathway to a tiny beach.” He said. “All rocks and cliff, but if you are brave climb up and take in the view.”

Louisa’s ordered arrived interrupting his suggestions.

“Will you have a coffee with me?” He asked.

“No thank you,” she said.

He walked her to the parking lot. Held the car door and waved as she pulled away.

Her mother thought it serendipitous she bumped into her high school boyfriend, and Louisa regretted telling of the encounter.

“Mom, I have a plan to get myself back, the me I miss, the me in need of a new perspective. No distractions.”

She biked the first day of her trip. Waved to folks walking, acquainted herself with the Inn keeper and his staff, and ate dinner alone, standing up, watching the waves crash on the rocky beach from her bedroom window. That night she slept without the usual racing thoughts or anxious imagined problems to solve. In the morning Louisa biked long and hard, climbed the cliff of rock that ascended from the beach and laid her back against its rough surface to look out to sea. In the evening she showered, dressed for dinner and was seated at a table for one as requested. She opened a book and laid it above her plate, bantered with the waiter, sipped a glass of wine and overheard the couple, a few tables over, discussing her singleness. Louisa disarmed them with a broad smile. She had found herself.

The waiter’s voice, and another more courteous, polite, could be heard coming closer. A chair found its way to Louisa’s table in the hands of the waiter standing behind the man with a sweet smile.

“Forgive me, Lou, but may I please have dinner with you?” He asked. All heads in the room turned. Ears waiting for an answer.

“Yes Andrew,” she said. “I would like that.”

The listeners clapped. The room exploded with cheers.