But A’s not saying any of that. Instead, he’s emptying the chopstick holder.
“What are you doing?” I ask. The woman behind the cash register is giving us a strange look, and I don’t blame her.
A doesn’t answer. Instead, he works the chopsticks into the shape of a heart, covering the table. Then he takes all the Sweet’N Low packets from our table and two others in order to turn the heart a pale paper pink.
It’s too much. And it’s awesome at the same time.
When he’s done, he points proudly to the heart. He looks like a kindergartner who’s just finished a fort.
“This,” he says, “is only about one-ninety-millionth of how I feel about you.”
I laugh. I think he’s forgotten that his heart is full of Sweet’N Low.
“I’ll try not to take it personally,” I tell him.
He seems a little offended. “Take what personally? You should take it very personally.”
“The fact that you used artificial sweetener?”
Saccharine. Everything fake. But also real.
He takes a pink packet from the heart and throws it playfully at me.
“Not everything is a symbol!” he shouts.
I am not going to let myself sit undefended. I pull a chopstick from the heart and use it like a sword. He takes up my challenge, and raises another chopstick in the same way. He lunges. I parry. We are happy fools.
The waiter comes over with some plates. A turns his head and I pierce his chest.
“I die!” A calls out.
“Who has the moo shu chicken?” the waiter asks.
“That’s his,” I say. “And the answer is, yes, we’re always like this.”
After the waiter leaves, A asks me, “Is that true? Are we always like this?”
“Well, it’s a little too early for always,” I answer. Not to ruin the moment. Just to make sure we’re not carried away by it.
“But it’s a good sign,” he says.
“Always,” I tell him.
I forget about the rest of my life. I don’t even have to push it away—I’ve forgotten about it. It’s no longer there. There is only now, there is only me and A and everything that we’re sharing. It doesn’t feel like amnesia as much as it feels like a sudden absence of noise.
At the end of the meal, we get our fortunes. Mine says:
YOU HAVE A NICE SMILE.
“This isn’t a fortune,” I say, showing it to A.
“No. You will have a nice smile—that would be a fortune,” he tells me.
Exactly. A fortune has to tell you what’s going to happen, not what already is.
And, really, who doesn’t have a nice smile?
“I’m going to send it back,” I say.
A looks amused. “Do you often send back fortune cookies?”
“No. This is the first time. I mean, this is a Chinese restaurant—”
“Malpractice.”
“Exactly.”
I wave for the waiter, who comes immediately.
“My fortune isn’t really a fortune, it’s just a statement,” I tell him. “And it’s a pretty superficial statement at that.”
The waiter nods and returns with a handful of cookies, each individually wrapped.
“I only need one,” I tell him. More than one would be cheating. “Wait one second.”
I open a second cookie—and am relieved by what I find inside.
ADVENTURE IS AROUND THE CORNER.
“Well done, sir,” A says to the waiter once I show it to them both.
“Your turn,” I say. A carefully opens his cookie, and practically beams when he reads what the fortune says.
“What?” I ask.
He holds it out to me.
ADVENTURE IS AROUND THE CORNER.
I am not a superstitious person. But I’m excited to get to that corner. Wherever it may be.
I know we don’t have much time left. I know that A and I are only borrowing this time from someone else, not receiving it entirely for ourselves. But I want to borrow it for as long as I can. I want him to keep talking to me. I want to keep listening to him.
Back in the library, I ask him to tell me more books to read. Because I know the answer to this question will get me to know him even more.
He shows me the book he was reading before. It’s called Feed.
“It’s about the difference between technological connection and human connection. It’s about how we can have so much information that we forget who we are, or at least who we’re supposed to be.” He takes me farther down the shelves, to the very end of the YA section, and holds up The Book Thief. “Have you read this?” I shake my head, and he continues. “It’s a Holocaust novel, and it’s narrated by death itself. Death is separate from everything, but he can’t help feeling like he’s a part of it all. And when he starts seeing the story of this little girl with a very hard life, he can’t look away. He has to know what will happen.” He pulls me back to an earlier shelf. “And on a lighter note, there’s this book, Destroy All Cars. It’s about how caring about something deeply can also make you hate the world, because the world can be really, really disappointing. But don’t worry—it’s also funny, too. Because that’s how you get through all the disappointments, right? You have to find it all funny.”
I agree. And I’d talk to him more about that, but he doesn’t want to stop. I’ve asked him the right question, and he wants to answer it fully. He shows me a book called First Day on Earth. “I know this will sound weird, but it’s about a boy in a support group for people who feel they were abducted by aliens. And he meets this other guy who may or may not be an alien. But it’s really about what it means to be human. And I read it a lot, whenever I find it in a library. Partly because I find new things every time I read it, but also because these books are always there for me. All of them are there for me. My life changes all the time, but books don’t change. My reading of them changes—I can bring new things to them each time. But the words are familiar words. The world is a place you’ve been before, and it welcomes you back.”