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Now I’m fairly certain that Noah Ross sounds a little bit touched.

“Well, you know,” I say, “interesting things happened the last time we were on a train together.” I smile at the memory of Noah pulling out that Swiss Army knife, breaking into Ryan’s brownstone. “I could even throw in a tuna sandwich with onions, or something equally pungent?”

“If you meet me at Penn Station in two hours,” Noah says, “I’ll bringyouthe best egg drop wonton soup you’ve ever had.”

“Well, I’m not going to tell my friend Meg’s mother that you said that, but I will meet you at Penn Station.”

I’m grinning as I hang up the phone.

“Say goodbye to editing,” Noah says as I open the soup. “Because these wontons are about to blow your mind.”

We’re pulling out of Penn Station with our laptops open on the table between us and way too much Chinese takeout for two people. Not surprisingly, the other passengers have given us a wide berth—empty seats abound. They’re probably jealous.

I swirl the Styrofoam container, give it a deep sniff, and then a long, delicious slurp.

“I pronounce this soup... the second best in the land,” I say solemnly.

Noah clutches his heart. “My world is shattered.”

“Speaking of your world,” I say, “what’s your character conundrum?” I want to make sure we cover everything during the three hours we’ve got together before Noah gets off the train to see his mom. Then I’ll turn around and take the three p.m. Acela back to New York. It’s a little absurd, and that’s what I like about it.

He sits up straighter, brings his fingers to rest on his keyboard. His dark hair falls over his eyes, and I bank the image of Noah Ross in work mode.

“Usually,” he says, “I start by asking what my characters want, and then what stands in their way of getting it. That how I get to know them.”

“Sure. Writing 101.”

“But the structure of this book is so different,” he says, “I can’t rely on a single guiding desire to propel the charactersfor five decades. I know Elizabeth is a doctor. I know Edward is a poet. I know what they look like, and how they walk, and what they eat for breakfast—”

“Ooh, what’s on the menu?”

“Cornflakes and a quartered orange,” Noah says. “At least, until Edward turns fifty. Then he learns to cook.”

“Took him long enough.”

“My problem is,” Noah says, “since they already have each other, what else do they want?”

I think about his question. In life and in fiction, most people come to be defined by their obstacles. What they overcome and what they don’t. Summiting the mountain often reveals an unexpected world. It makes me think about my own obstacles recently—with Ryan, and with Noah—and how they’re changing what I thought I wanted.

“Maybe you need to ask yourself how they imagine the rest of their life,” I say. “Then you could explore the scenes where they get close to that life. And the scenes where they fall short. Their love story might be the opposite of what they planned,” I say. “That would be the fun of it, proving themselves wrong. Finding beauty in their missteps.”

“I like that,” Noah says. “And it works, because I think he’s mercurial. Someone who can still surprise his wife, even decades into their marriage.”

“Learning to cook at fifty would surprise me, too,” I say. “And if she’s a doctor...” I trail off. I find myself thinking of my mother. “She’s meticulous, ambitious, generous, and stubborn.”

Noah looks up from his computer to me. “What does shewish for? When she stands on the Gapstow Bridge and lets herself dream big?”

I close my eyes. What did my mother want? I used to think it was to set the bar high for everyone she loved, to give us something to reach for. Recently, I see it differently. I don’t think her final words to me were a gauntlet, but an expression of her faith. I think my momalreadybelieved that I could really, really love someone—because she’d shown me how, by loving me that way in the ten years we had together. I think her words were a parachute, tucked away but always there, ready to catch me when I’m ready to leap.

“More,” is what I tell Noah. “She wants more time. More memories. More laughter. More little moments you don’t think you’ll remember but you do. She doesn’t want it to end. She wants more of what she already has.”

Noah’s typing like Rachmaninoff. He types for several minutes without pause. “This is what I needed.” When he looks up at me, his eyes are bright and excited. “I don’t know how you did it, Lanie, but you got me writing again.”

“Duh,” I say. “It was my Fifty Ways list.”

“That must be it.” He gives me a look I can’t quite decode.

I take a second egg roll. “These are phenomenal, by the way.”