Madeline sipped her coffee. Blazing hot and rich. She loved it that way. She couldn’t get that black gold flowing out of the cheap coffeemaker in her apartment, the one she had bought at Goodwill for five dollars.

She remained quiet. Listening. Nervous.

Heart thumping from more than caffeine.

“The last time we were here, at the beginning of the last semester, and we talked about your thesis, I think I . . . I think I may have given you the wrong impression. Sometimes I get a little carried away when I talk to students, and I believe I reached out and placed my hand on your knee. I hope that gesture didn’t make you uncomfortable.”

He paused and seemed to be waiting for an answer.

So Madeline gave him one. “It was a little surprising. Yes.”

“Well, I’m sorry about that. And I understand if you don’t want me to have any more involvement in your thesis. It wasn’t my intention to make you feel uncomfortable. I’ve given you space for these last months because of what I did. I worried . . . well, I worried you wouldn’t want to have anything to do with me. I was just trying to help you while Dr. Nye was incapacitated. And I’ve tried to give you some space and not contact you during the rest of the fall semester, in the hope you would see I wasn’t trying to hurt you or crowd you. But I wanted to apologize the whole time. So I’m doing it today. It’s late, but I’m doing it.”

Around them, people talked. The machines steamed and hissed behind the counter.

Hoffman looked expectant. The dynamic between them had shifted. She was judge and jury. He the accused, hoping for mercy.

You have to do what you have to do.

“It’s okay,” she said, shrugging it off. “Don’t worry about it.”

“Really?” Hoffman’s face brightened. “Are you sure?”

“Yeah, it’s okay. Forget about it.”

“Thank you for understanding,” he said. “My students are kind of my life. I don’t have any children. And I’m not married, so I tend to pour myself into what I do at the university. That’s why I haven’t written as much poetry over the last few years. And maybe that’s why I don’t always know what’s appropriate.”

“Appropriate”? That was the word Sophia used when Madeline had told her about Hoffman.

Madeline looked down as the steam from the coffee rose past her face. Sophia. She was all Madeline could think of. Sophia had known Hoffman—a little. And Zach knew him better. Had Sophia said something to Hoffman about touching Madeline? Was that why he’d apologized?

Or had he been in a funk because of Sophia’s death? Maybe they shared that shock and grief.

She wanted to know.

“Did someone . . . did—”

“Did what?”