Daniel Martin

She smiled at him as they waited for their dessert, her chin poised on her clasped hands. 'You're being very silent.' 'That's how men cry.

We think we grow old, we grow wise and more tolerant; we just grow more lazy.

Perhaps twenty minutes later he realized she had gone to sleep. He quietly removed his now stiff arm, then turned away. It must have woken her a little After a moment he felt her turn as well and lay a hand, instinctively, like a sleeping wife, across his hips; as if, in some dream, he was the one who escaped.