—Just tell me you love me.

—Sometimes “I love you” doesn’t sound like it’s enough.

—It’s all I’ve ever wanted.

She let go of him, straightened her clothes, opened the door and hurried down the stairs, without looking back and without shutting the door behind her.

Jesse waited by the window. Anna appeared on the street, snaking her way through the card games on her way to the restaurant. Almost out of sight she stopped, turning back and waving at him. He waved back and by the time he’d lowered his hand she was gone.

It was time to decide. He checked his watch. There was only an hour until he was meant to address a group of unknown demonstrators. He didn’t even know what they would be demonstrating about. In all likelihood they would not recognize him and he’d struggle to be heard. The concert started at nine. According to the Russian girl it only lasted seventy minutes. Jesse tapped the face of his handsome watch bought in better times. As he pondered on whether to accept the invitation, the memory of another watch crept into his thoughts, a watch he’d never worn. It had been given to him at the very start of his career while he’d been on his first national tour. The manager of the concert hall had been so pleased with the unexpected success of the performances, three sold-out events in the town of Monroe, Louisiana, that he’d presented Jesse with a handsome box, containing a nicely made watch with a leather strap with

MADE IN MONROE

embossed on the back. Jesse didn’t remember too much about the watch itself but he remembered the manager very well. The man had knocked on his dressing-room door after the final performance, snuck in with the stealth of a mistress. Anna had been in the room and witnessed the manager nervously offering Jesse the watch as a token of his gratitude before hurrying out again. Jesse had laughed out loud at the odd manners of this pleasant man until he’d noticed that Anna wasn’t laughing. She’d explained that man wanted show his gratitude, he just wasn’t able to show it in public. He couldn’t come onto the stage at the end of the show and give Jesse the watch. He couldn’t invite them to dinner sie he didn’t want to be seen with Jesse and Anna in a restaurant. He could employ Jesse to sing, he could be seen applauding, but as soon as Jesse stepped off that stage he couldn’t be seen near him. It was a fine watch, a handsome watch, par ticularly for a young man who’d yet to make much money, but Jesse hadn’t kept it, leaving it behind in the dressing room with a note:

Dinner would’ve been plenty.

He’d never been booked there to play again.