We’re on the corner with “Monday Nights Cafe” and “The Tea” but instead of entering either of them, we turn another corner onto a street lined with ‘artsy shops’ and Dominic holds the door for me at a small restaurant called “Rarey Bird.”

Is ‘rarey’ even a word?

The sign over the door is something like a lyrebird with zebra stripes on its feathers, but I don’t get long to study it before I’m distracted by everything inside the shop.

It’s loud. Visually loud.

There are old movie posters hanging from the walls in vivid technicolor alongside printed pages from famous poems and novels I remember reading back in high school. “A Tale of Two Cities' and ‘Emma.’ ‘The Raven.’ ‘The Pied Piper of Hamelin.’

“You recognize a lot of these,” Mr. Giang raises his eyebrows, clearly impressed, and I realize I was muttering to myself. “Me and a few friends had an afternoon of it trying to identify everything on these walls. I think they make them tricky on purpose. They even removed the titles from the movie posters. Do you know that one?”

He points toward a large poster of Marilyn Monroe over a table toward the back.

“Gentlemen Prefer Blondes,” I say quickly.

“Ha,” he laughs with that same impressed expression, “Your brain must be a library. Shall we join Marilyn then?”

I nod, not that it matters to me one way or another where we sit, so we maneuver through the mostly empty restaurant to the little nook below the poster where a wooden table stands marked with hundreds of pairs of initials.

It’s quiet. 

Not totally quiet, but the music being played is smooth jazz barely louder than a murmur, and the only other patron is wearing AirPods, in his own little world.

I feel my shoulders relax slightly as Mr. Giang pulls out a chair for me.

There’s space for my legs under the table too, thank God. There’s not much more awkward than feeling my twigs run against someone else’s.

But despite the space, I still tuck them back slightly for the moment.

I’ll only stretch them out if they start going numb.

“You must be pretty into literature and movies,” Mr. Giang is saying, and I almost sigh.

Yet another topic I’m no good at making sound ‘normal.’

That’s what you do when you grow up without friends.

But I opt out of giving the first answer that comes to mind, even if that’s the last time I can remember reading or watching anything simply because I felt like it.

I could just say that I’m an introvert, but instead, I accidentally admit that I’m boring.

“I’m a professional editor, so I try to keep up with the trends as well as all the classics for work.”

Or, I should anyway. I haven’t had the time to read or watch anything unrelated to a deadline in ages, and I probably won’t again, until Ayla’s mother retakes charge of her.

Is she going to be seeing her dad at all?

None of my business. 

Don’t think that.

Mr. Giang opens his mouth like he’s going to say something but before he can, the waiter arrives with our menus and gives us a brief rundown of the weekly specials.

Bloody Mary Crab soup. Cucumber cooler. Bagels with boozy cherry jam and cream cheese.

Nope. Don’t consume alcohol on a first date. That’s first-date rule number one.

And though I have no reason to have any sort of suspicions, I have no reason not to.

I wonder if it shows in my posture.

I try to appear a little more perceptibly relaxed as I scan my menu for a relatively inexpensive item and order Mushroom steak with cheddar gravy at random.

I’m not sure if I’m paying for my food or if he is, but either way, something in the middle price range feels like the safest bet. I’ll avoid emptying either one of our wallets and any potential offense if he is the one paying.

How much money do you even make working at a convenience store? I haven’t worked at one since I was a teen.

Well, that’s probably why he still lives with his folks.

"So, editor. I admit I don’t know a lot about that process," Mr. Giang smiles as he hands back his menu and the waiter leaves with our orders. “What’s the job like?” 

“Slow,” I shrug, “I work in developmental editing, so I’m helping authors…develop…their plots.” 

Think of a better word.

“I help make them more functional. That’s the main thing…”

Out of the corner of my eye, I can see two teenage girls slip inside hurriedly, brushing off the light snow settled on their shoulders. They sit down at the furthest possible table away from us, laughing and whispering to each other, but their hushing seems to make its way through the whole room.

“Do you work with an agency or independently?”

“Agency.”

“Good agency?”

I’m pretending I don’t hear the giggling, though I’m absolutely certain now that the girls are laughing at something or someone in the room.

You learn to recognize the change in tone after you’ve lived with it long enough.

“Pretty good agency.”

“Nice coworkers?”

“They seem to enjoy their jobs.”

“Are the authors interesting? Quirky creative types?”

“Some of them. They don’t work for the agency long term, just project by project.”

I still have to review the edits Ms. Lay sent in response to my last notes and vacuum. When was the last time I vacuumed?

“Oh. Okay. So like, which was your favorite project to work on?”

“Umm, probably ‘Bloody Lovesong.’”

“Oh? Sounds…intense.”

It was the easiest.

“I’ll have to look it up sometime. I read a lot of books because I like to be able to give suggestions about the stuff we sell at my family’s store.”

And I still need to read over Ms. Meng’s first draft.

“Do you have a book you’d consider your absolute favorite?”

It’s gonna be a long weekend.

“It’s hard to pick,” I smile at him mildly.

“I know right?” Mr. Giang laughs, suddenly excited, “Me and my siblings just devour books. We like to try to read the same ones at the same time so we can talk about them in our sibling group chat. We have a book club, well, my sisters don’t usually attend because they’re busy with school and stuff. But my brother and I have a book club with one of my other friends, and we always find the craziest books we’ll pick up at used bookstores and stuff. You really never know when you’re going to find absolute gold. Me and my younger sister, Cocoa, are still obsessed with this one we all read like a year ago and now we’re always quoting lines from it whenever it seems applicable in conversation. It’s become an inside joke sort of thing,” he laughs like a loon, and his smile reaches to the edges of his face again.

That…felt….strange.

“My parents read a lot too. I think we get it from them. My dad has a giant library in his home office, and we used to ‘check out’ books from it with this little note on the fridge, marking down who had what book so we would know if anything ever went missing…”

“Oh?”

It washes in and it washes out again, just that fast, as he smiles so…sincerely?...affectionately…talking about his family - some sort of swishing…movement…a twisting sensation in my chest.

And then it’s gone again.

Did I want it to stay? 

Did I want it to disappear?

I need a minute.

When I bring my thoughts back into focus, Mr. Giang is still talking. 

He’s pulled his phone out and is swiping quickly to unlock it, smiling enthusiastically, “...We meet every Saturday evening if you’d like to join us. It’s just a small group right now, me and my little brother, Ben, and my friend Austin. But hey, three is a crowd; four could be a real book club,” he laughs.

“Ohh, I…”

…should say ‘no.’

I know my schedule is already packed to the bursting, and I don’t have time. I couldn’t possibly manage to fit this into my schedule without something somewhere else in my agenda starting to fall apart, or at the very least, deplete in quality in one way or another.

But I don’t know how to say ‘no.’

And I never learn.

I start to reach out like he’s going to hand me his phone before I correct myself, remembering I’m not giving out or receiving another number.

“Um…what time on Saturdays?”

“6 p.m. Does that work for you?”

“Yeah. Sure. That’ll work.”

The second I say yes, I’m hit by another wave of exhaustion that seems to dull everything - my hearing, my vision - even my headache, and my whole body seems to be weighed down. 

I’m just tired. 

I need sleep. 

How many hours have I been awake now?

Nevermind that. Focus.

I reach into my bag to pull out my phone, and it somehow throws itself out of my hands and onto the floor by my chair.

I just stare at it a little dazedly for too long in silence.

How could…why would it just fall out of my hand?

“Are you alright?” I hear Mr. Giang asking, his face contorted with worry, and I try to brush it off, leaning over to retrieve my cell.

But Mr. Giang is already on his feet with my phone in his hand, handing it back to me, as I repeat quickly ‘I’m fine. I’m fine,” and my hand isn’t as steady as I would like it to be as it brushes up against his, and my fingers grip the screen covered in a brand-new web of cracks.