Clare’s gaze suddenly zeroed in on Donna. It was Donna’s turn to sit back in her chair. “Yes, I’ve seen them. Filled to overflowing with words. You are as much a writer as I am. At least I put my work out there.”

“You read them?” Clare’s voice ratcheted up several octaves.

“No! Of course not,” Donna defended herself.

Clare watched her friend for any signs of a lie. She couldn’t bear the thought of someone reading her private thoughts.

“I swear!” Donna continued. “I’m not barbaric. But I will say, I wanted to. I want to know what you scribble about in private.”

Clare narrowed her eyes. “Nothing, just my life.”

“Just journals?” Donna pressed.

“Maybe a short story or two…a couple of poems.” Clare shrugged. “I don’t know. I don’t do it the way you do.”

“And what is that supposed to mean?”

“The stuff I write, it’s just for me. I don’t have the desire.”

“Desire?”

“Publication, recognition, for other people to read my stuff. It’s mine.”

Donna took another sip from her beer and shook her head. “I don’t believe you.”

Clare laughed. “I don’t care if you believe me. It’s true.”

“Have you ever let anyone read your work?”

Without meaning to, Clare took a sharp intake of breath through flared nostrils.

“Ah ha!” Donna pointed at her across the table. “I knew it! You once upon a time let someone read your work. Or submitted it. Or turned it in for a high school writing assignment and whoever it was fucked you up too early and shot you down.”

Clare shook her head. “The only other person I’ve ever let read my work…” She hesitated. It had been almost three years. She had never even uttered his name to anyone in her new life. And now, it was right there on the tip of her tongue. “He loved everything I ever wrote.” She stared out the window, not really seeing beyond the nonsensical blur of this busy city she had so effectively hidden herself away in.

“So why keep it to yourself?” Donna pressed.

Clare returned her attention to the expanse of table between them and shook her head again. “I guess, mostly, it really never occurred to me to do anything with my writing.” That was true, sort of. She had occasionally, certainly more recently, considered what it might be like to stand on that stage one night herself, but she never got any farther than imagining the embarrassment, her own hands trembling just like she’d witnessed in so many others. “I’m not sure what the point would be, I guess.”

“What do you mean, what’s the point? The story is the point. The connection, the creation—the rush of knowing someone read your words and felt something you created. That is the fucking point.”