“Well, I’m glad I didn’t have to meet her.”
But you didn’t get to see me, I think. I keep it to myself.
We press our knees together under the table. My hands find hers and we hold them there. We talk as if none of this is happening, as if we can’t feel life pulse through all the spots where we’re touching.
“I’m sorry for calling you a jerk,” she says. “I just—this is hard enough as it is. And I was so sure I was right.”
“I was a jerk. I’m taking for granted how normal this all feels.”
“Justin sometimes does that. Pretends I didn’t tell him something I just told him. Or makes up this whole story, then laughs when I fall for it. I hate that.”
“I’m sorry—”
“No, it’s okay. I mean, it’s not like he was the first one. I guess there’s something about me that people love to fool. And I’d probably do it—fool people—if it ever occurred to me.”
I take all of the chopsticks out of their holder and put them on the table.
“What are you doing?” Rhiannon asks.
I use the chopsticks to outline the biggest heart possible. Then I use the Sweet’N Low packets to fill it in. I borrow some from two other tables when I run out.
When I’m done, I point to the heart on the table.
“This,” I say, “is only about one ninety-millionth of how I feel about you.”
She laughs.
“I’ll try not to take it personally,” she says.
“Take what personally?” I say. “You should take it very personally.”
“The fact that you used artificial sweetener?”
I take a Sweet’N Low packet and fling it at her.
“Not everything is a symbol!” I shout.
She picks up a chopstick and brandishes it as a sword. I pick up another chopstick in order to duel.
We are doing this when the food arrives. I’m distracted and she gets a good shot in at my chest.
“I die!” I proclaim.
“Who has the moo shu chicken?” the waiter asks.
The waiter continues to indulge us as we laugh and talk our way through lunch. He’s a real pro, the kind of waiter who refills your water glass when it’s half empty, without you noticing he’s doing it.
He delivers us our fortune cookies at the end of the meal. Rhiannon breaks hers neatly in half, checks out the slip of paper, and frowns.
“This isn’t a fortune,” she says, showing it to me.
YOU HAVE A NICE SMILE.
“No. You will have a nice smile—that would be a fortune,” I tell her.
“I’m going to send it back.”
I raise an eyebrow … or at least try to. I’m sure I look like I’m having a stroke.
“Do you often send back fortune cookies?”
“No. This is the first time. I mean, this is a Chinese restaurant—”
“Malpractice.”
“Exactly.”
Rhiannon flags the waiter down, explains the predicament, and gets a nod. When he returns to our table, he has a half dozen more fortune cookies for her.
“I only need one,” she tells him. “Wait one second.”
The waiter and I are both paying close attention as Rhiannon cracks open her second fortune cookie. This time, it gets a nice smile.
She shows it to both of us.
ADVENTURE IS AROUND THE CORNER.
“Well done, sir,” I tell the waiter.
Rhiannon prods me to open mine. I do, and find it’s the exact same fortune as hers.
I don’t send it back.
We return to the library with about a half hour to spare. The librarian catches us walking back in, but doesn’t say a word.
“So,” Rhiannon asks me, “what should I read next?”
I show her Feed. I tell her all about The Book Thief. I drag her to find Destroy All Cars and First Day on Earth. I explain to her that these have been my companions all these years, the constants from day to day, the stories I can always return to even if mine is always changing.
“What about you?” I ask her. “What do you think I should read next?”
She takes my hand and leads me to the children’s section. She looks around for a second, then heads over to a display at the front. I see a certain green book sitting there and panic.
“No! Not that one!” I say.
But she isn’t reaching for the green book. She’s reaching for Harold and the Purple Crayon.
“What could you possibly have against Harold and the Purple Crayon?” she asks.
“I’m sorry. I thought you were heading for The Giving Tree.”
Rhiannon looks at me like I’m an insane duck. “I absolutely HATE The Giving Tree.”
I am so relieved. “Thank goodness. That would’ve been the end of us, had that been your favorite book.”
“Here—take my arms! Take my legs!”
“Take my head! Take my shoulders!”
“Because that’s what love’s about!”
“That kid is, like, the jerk of the century,” I say, relieved that Rhiannon will know what I mean.
“The biggest jerk in the history of all literature,” Rhiannon ventures. Then she puts down Harold and moves closer to me.
“Love means never having to lose your limbs,” I tell her, moving in for a kiss.
“Exactly,” she murmurs, her lips soon on mine.
It’s an innocent kiss. We’re not about to start making out in the beanbag chairs offered by the children’s room. But that doesn’t stop the ice-water effect when George’s mother calls out his name, shocked and angry.