Текст книги "Sleepless"

Автор книги: Cyn Balog

Соавторы: Cyn Balog
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CHAPTER 21

Julia

Hart Avenue isn’t exactly the kind of place where you’d want to hang out after hours. Actually, I don’t think I’d want to hang out here before or during hours, either.

But then again, I’m not really sure what I’m thinking.

“Hon,” my mom says as we pass a bag lady meandering down the street with a shopping cart filled with trash bags for the fifteenth time. “What are we doing?”

“Uh,” I say, trying to remember the excuse I came up with during my Sweetie Pi’s shift. “This is a good street to practice parallel parking on.”

And really, it is. It’s one of the few streets in town with parallel parking and meters; plus there are so many cars and people and garbage cans and other obstacles everywhere that I imagine if I can park my mom’s RAV4 here, I’ll be able to park anywhere.

“Oh,” she says. I make a turn and head down the next street, preparing to go around the block and cruise down Hart again. Just as I’m beginning to think she bought the excuse, she says, “But why do I feel like we’re casing the joint?”

I wonder what mobster movie my lily-white mom got that saying from and shrug. “I’m looking for a parking space.”

“We passed a bunch.” We turn onto Hart again, and she points out the window. “What about that one?”

“Um, too narrow.”

We pass another. “And that one?”

“Those cars I’d be parking between are black! It’s too hard to see them in the dark.”

“Hon, are you nervous? Don’t be. Parallel parking is simple.”

I’m not, really—about that, anyway. My dad has put the cones on the street outside our house so often that I could probably park anywhere in my sleep. I’m as ready as I’ll ever be for my driver’s test in a couple of days. But I wanted to find out more about Mr. Geronimo DeMarchelle. Even though I’m positive I would remember a guy like him if I’d ever met him before, I still have the strangest sense of déjà vu around him, like we not only knew each other once before … but we knew each other well. And there were things that didn’t add up. How did he know where to find Bret and me that night at the party? How did he know that Griffin was my boyfriend? That’s why I performed a dozen games of twenty questions on him, trying to knock something loose from his past, some common bond. But there was nothing. Our lives are so different that he might as well have arrived in a time machine. So when he walked me to my mother’s car at the end of our shift, I couldn’t help wanting to know more.

The kicker came right before we parted, when he kissed my hand. After that, he nodded respectfully to my mother, placed his hat on his head, and sauntered away, whistling. He put the hat on like it was something he’d done every day of his life. Griffin would have done something like that as a joke, as part of an act, and would have looked utterly ridiculous. But Eron seemed comfortable with it, and when he kissed my hand, his eyes bored into me so that immediately my wrist went limp. Then shivers traveled up my arm, down my body to my knees, so I had to grab on to the car door to stop from toppling over on the curb.

And now, even though all that happened nearly an hour ago, I can still feel the imprint of his lips on my hand. Griffin used to kiss me deeply on the mouth, like they do in the movies, and I never felt as much. Okay, I felt more than with Bret, yes. Maybe a quickening of the pulse, a little fire. Sometimes it wouldn’t even feel all that wonderful, like something was nibbling off little pieces of my flesh. Griffin was the first guy I’d ever kissed, so I assumed it would always be like that, with anyone. So now all I can think of is what it would be like to kiss a guy who could practically set my hand ablaze with a G-rated, gentlemanly gesture. I’m the Ice Princess. Things like that can’t happen to me.

I search the street again and there’s no sign of a guy in spats and a white dress shirt. This is ridiculous, anyway. What would I say to him if I saw him? Hey, you forgot your apron. It’s not like I can test out my kissing theories on him in the middle of the street, surrounded by a bunch of drug dealers and homeless people, while my mom waits in the car. This plan has failure written all over it. And he said he’d be working at Sweetie Pi’s tomorrow, so I am not sure why I have this burning feeling that if I don’t see him right now, I’ll go crazy.

There’s a guy walking down the street, and though he’s too short and his white bald head shines in the streetlight, I slam on the brakes beside him. A car horn blares behind me. My mom grabs the door handle for support. I catch a glimpse of myself in the side mirror. I look like a madwoman. Like I’m obsessed. And over what? What I really need right now is to go home and get some sleep.

Sighing, I slow in front of a parking space I saw the past three times we drove by. “I guess I’ll just do this one,” I say. I line my front bumper up with the parked minivan’s front bumper and throw the car into reverse. Then I check my rearview mirror, turn the wheel all the way to the right, and slowly back into the parking spot.

As I’m straightening the wheel, my mom beams at me. “Bravo!” she says, clapping. “I don’t think I could have done any better.”

She opens the car door to check and I can see the curb—six inches. It’s perfect. “Thanks,” I mutter, too embarrassed with myself to properly celebrate the victory. I check my rearview mirror again to make sure no traffic is coming before I pull out.

And there he is.

In a picture window across the street is Eron’s figure, framed in light. His back is to me but I can tell by the shock of black hair, now a little messed, and the well-defined curve of his back. He’s in one of the shabbier buildings on the street, standing on a second-floor landing, spreading out laundry. He’s … he’s … not wearing any clothes! Before all the air can be pushed out of my lungs, before I can have a coronary, I blink a few times and focus. No … at that moment, he hikes up a pair of gym shorts that have fallen dangerously below his thin waist. He brushes the dark hair out of his eyes and turns his broad back toward the window, then sinks out of view. I sit there for a moment, quietly willing him to come back, and then I remember my mom.

Now she has both feet pressed down on the floor mat and is biting her lip as she watches a couple of lowlifes leering on a stoop near us. “Ready to go whenever you are,” she says, but I know she’s thinking, Now, please?

“Um. Oh. Okay.” I glance up at the window again as I shift the car into drive. It’s not like I can throw stones up at his window and say, Yoo-hoo! I was just in the neighborhood! anyway.

Eron turns back toward the street, and now there’s a worried look on his face. He picks a T-shirt up, shakes it out as if he’s about to put it on, and then …

Then …

He disappears.

I’m vaguely aware my jaw has fallen into my lap. The white material of his shirt—the material that only two seconds ago was in his hands—floats peacefully in the air and settles somewhere out of view. Okay, no. That didn’t just happen. He must have fallen, or jumped away, or something. He couldn’t have … There’s no way …

“Let’s get a move on!” my mom urges in her most commanding voice, startling me.

I spring upright, forgetting I’ve already put the car into drive, and press on the accelerator.

And barrel straight into the minivan parked ahead of us.

CHAPTER 22

Eron

Shortly after ten this morning, I become human again and rush to the apartment on Hart Avenue in my bare feet, hoping not too many people will see my shameful nakedness. When I climb the stairs and open the door to the living room, I groan. The room smells even more like rotting garbage than it did yesterday. Worse, Harmon, that drunken fool, has thrown all my clothes into a messy pile in the corner, and a partly bald yellow cat is lounging in it, licking its paws.

I shoo the cat away and shake out my trousers, balking at the dreadful stench. If I put these on, I will smell like a dying animal for the remainder of the day.

The doorbell rings, and I’m still attempting to determine if any of my clothing can be salvaged when I fling open the door.

I stop shaking out my shirt and stare.

It’s Julia.

“How … how did you know where I live?” I ask, my body still frozen.

“You told me,” she says.

We stand there for a moment, awkwardly, until I remember simultaneously that I’m nearly naked and that I am not being a very good host. “Where are my manners? Please come in,” I say, throwing my cat-hair-covered button-down shirt on and motioning to my sleeping couch. There are a few dirty dishes and cereal bowls there. I quickly scoop them up, spilling sour milk on my shirt. Perfect.

Julia looks around unsurely, wrinkling her nose, then sits on the couch. Her long legs are bare. She has a large flesh-colored bandage over the wound she got yesterday, but it looks much darker, almost brown, against her pale skin. “You live here?” She seems shocked, but no more surprised than I was when I walked in.

I nod. “Would you like something to drink?” I ask. I am relieved when she shakes her head. From what I’ve seen, I don’t think Harmon would be too pleased parting with his beloved ale, and I know it’s not Julia’s drink of choice. I turn in time to see her gaze move abruptly away from my collarbone. There is still a rather jagged red scar there, where the machine at the textile mill wrenched my arm apart from it. She doesn’t seem any more disgusted by it than she does by her surroundings, but still, I feel myself blushing like a schoolgirl. “Is there something I can help you with?”

“You said you had the noon shift at Sweetie Pi’s. So do I. I was hoping you could give me a ride?” She smiles sheepishly, and it is so endearing I would say yes in a heartbeat, if only … “I would have called but I didn’t have your number.”

“Um …” I watch a large cockroach scuttle across the floor, near her delicate toes. She doesn’t notice. “I don’t … do that.”

“You don’t do what?”

“I don’t have a … vehicle,” I answer.

“You take the bus or something?”

“No, I walk.”

“Walk? It’s like five miles.”

She says it as if the moon is easier to reach, as if walking is not something that’s done anymore. “I … like the exercise.”

“Oh. I’ll walk with you.”

I survey the shambles that was my quality suit—the herringbone jacket, the fine suspenders—which the cat is now chewing on. I wonder how many customers I will scare away in that. How long it will be until Julia is also frightened away. If only I’d never told her where I lived! I pull the shirt tightly across my chest. “Of course,” I say hesitantly. “Let me just find some suitable attire.”

She shrugs and I head down the hallway, hoping that Harmon has something that will fit me other than the horrid rags he offered earlier, something that won’t be too disgraceful. I can hear him snoring before I push open the door. When I do, I rifle through his drawers quietly. They’re mostly empty, because much of their contents are lying in soiled piles on the ground. In the closet, I find a pair of denim jeans like I used to wear in the textile mill, a belt, and a white shirt that isn’t too wrinkled. I dress quickly in the hallway. The jeans are the wrong size, a little too short and a little too loose, but the belt helps. I tuck the shirt in, splash some water on my face, and sigh. For the first time in a hundred years, I need a shave, but I do not have a razor. And since I can’t find one in Harmon’s mess, and I’d rather not leave Julia to do battle with the cockroaches any longer than I have to, I step into my dress shoes and hurry to her. “I’m ready,” I say, rubbing my chin as if that will help erase the awful stubble from it.

If my presentation is inadequate, she doesn’t seem to notice. I think she was more questioning when I was wearing my fine suit. Perhaps she is in too much shock from the filthy apartment, too eager to escape it, because she stands and follows me out the door, clinging closely to my heels. We walk outside and down the front stairs, to the street. I say, “I’m sorry about the apartment. I haven’t had the time to—”

Immediately she says, “Oh, no, that’s okay. I hope you weren’t upset by me coming over. I just wanted to see if I could bum a ride because … my mom’s car had a little accident.”

“Oh? I hope nobody was hurt,” I murmur.

She shakes her head. We walk in silence a little more and then she says, “Actually, that wasn’t the reason I came over.”

“Oh?” I repeat, staring at the ground. Because I already know from her incessant questioning yesterday why she came to my home. She’s still suspicious. And who’s to blame her? I play the part of a modern youth sorely.

“Tell me how you know so much about me,” she says. Out of the corner of my eye, I see her looking straight ahead, face tense.

“I’m sure I don’t know what you mean.”

“You know so much more about me than any stranger would. That’s what you’re supposed to be, right? A stranger. But you’re not.”

I force a laugh. “Julia, I’m not sure what you’re suggesting, but—”

“There’s something really weird going on. And you’re part of it.” She takes a deep breath. “I’ve met you before, haven’t I?”

“No.” But I’m not very good at lying. “Not exactly.”

“Did you know Griffin?”

I nod a little.

“From …?”

She whirls around and brings her eyes to meet mine. I swallow. If she holds my gaze for much longer, I know I will tell her everything. I break eye contact quickly. “He is … was, I mean, an acquaintance.”

Of course I can see the puzzlement on her face. She brings her hair forward, over her ear, to cover her scars, suddenly self-conscious. “That message you had. Asking me to be careful. I’ve been trying to figure out who could have sent it, because other than my parents, nobody else would care that much about me. It was from Griffin, right?”

“Yes.”

“He gave you a message because he wanted to protect me? But why … unless he knew he was going to die?” She stops. Her eyes widen. “Wait … when did he give you that message?”

I know she is putting the pieces together, and all I can do is stand there and watch the curtain I’ve placed between us unravel. “Julia, I …,” I begin, but I don’t know what else to say.

“He died weeks ago, but strange things have been happening since then. Things that make me feel like he’s still here.” She taps on her temple. “I know it’s crazy.”

I watch her silently, trying not to leak anything, but I know it isn’t working.

She gasps. “So it’s true. He gave you that message after he died, didn’t he?”

CHAPTER 23

Julia

“Julia …,” he says, looking away.

Okay. Did I just say that aloud? That I think my dead boyfriend is contacting me from beyond the grave, and Eron is the conduit? Way to win friends and influence people. “Um, forget I ever said anything,” I say lamely, noticing a storm drain that I would love to climb into.

“I don’t think you’re crazy, Julia,” he says after a moment.

Well, sure he doesn’t … yet. He doesn’t know that I could have sworn I saw him disappear into thin air last night. “Really?”

“Really.” He says it like he means it. Griffin would have been on to insult number twelve by now.

“Who are you?” I ask softly. “Are you someone who can communicate with the dead? Have you been speaking with—”

He extends his hand as if to say, Hold it there, little lady. He’s obviously trying to calm me, because I can feel the heat swirling in my face and the pounding in my temples, as if there’s a storm inside me raging to get out. “No, nothing like that.”

I look down at the olive skin of his hand. There’s something all too familiar about the way he holds his hand above my shoulder so that it’s almost, but not quite, touching my skin. “Why do I feel like I’ve known you longer than just three days?”

“It’s not important who I am,” he says. “The important thing is that you—”

“Stay safe,” I say, rolling my eyes. “I have parents who warn me about that every day. Why you?”

He doesn’t answer my question, just stands there, fidgeting from one foot to the other. It’s odd that at times he seems so mature, beyond-his-years mature, yet sometimes, he’s almost like a little boy.

“Where did you get that scar? On your shoulder?”

He shakes his head. “No matter. It was a long time ago.”

I know that they’re obvious, that he’s probably seen them before, but I lift the hair from my cheek and tilt my chin into the sunlight. I’m not sure why I want to tell him now, but I’m not sure of so many things when it comes to him. Maybe it’s because I’ll go mad if I don’t get answers from him now. “I’ll tell you my story if you tell me yours,” I whisper.

“You don’t have to say a thing,” he says, gently taking my hand away from my cheek. It’s as if he already knows how difficult it would be to tell. As if he already knows everything anyway. He says, “Your beloved … Griffin. Did you trust him?”

“Yeah,” I say immediately, but the second the word leaves my lips, my resolve weakens. “I mean, I guess. We had a weird relationship.”

“Weird?”

“Well, he liked to joke a lot. He’d laugh at a funeral. Nothing was ever serious to him. But he was a good guy.”

“And he loved you.”

“Yes. Well. We never said so, in so many words.”

He smiles. “It only takes three.”

“No, you see … we didn’t talk about anything serious. Ever. And I kind of liked that.”

He looks puzzled. “You did?”

“Well, yeah. I’m … Something happened to me when I was a kid. And afterward, everyone walked on eggshells around me. But Griffin didn’t. We never talked about serious stuff like that. He treated me like anyone else. Which was good.”

I bite my tongue. There I go again, spilling my soul to him, as if we’re old friends and didn’t just meet three days ago. Maybe it’s because I’d never have been caught having this kind of serious discussion with Griffin and I’m starved for a heart-to-heart. Pathetic. I can just imagine Griffin pretending to throw a rope around his neck and hang himself. “And we were not really an emotional, lovey-dovey type of couple. Why am I telling you this? I need to shut up.”

He laughs. “No, you don’t. I like hearing you talk.”

“Really?” I turn to him, and his face is serious as he nods. No indication that he’s going to poke fun at me. “You really don’t think I’m a nut job?”

He laughs. “Not at all.”

“I like talking to you, too.”

I’m just starting to feel better, like maybe I’m not completely losing it, when suddenly my flip-flop catches on an uneven piece of pavement and I fall forward. I land half in the grass, half on the sidewalk. My palms and my knees break my fall, but I scrape the left one of each on the pavement. Blushing, I roll over onto my backside, inspecting my bleeding body parts. While this is when Griffin and Bret would laugh and say, “Have a nice trip?” or something, Eron rushes to my side and pulls a handkerchief out of the pocket of his baggy jeans. Two thoughts hit me at once: First, what guy who isn’t eighty years old carries a handkerchief? And secondly, is it possible ever to meet Eron without having an injury? Is there a reason I become a bumbling idiot around him?

My palm is just a little red and coated with gravel, so Eron brushes the grit away from my knee and clamps the cloth over it. It’s not bleeding as much as the cut on my shin yesterday did, but now I have a wound on each of my legs. I look like I shaved with sandpaper. I’m going to make a great impression in New York.

The injuries sting, but suddenly there’s a throbbing in my ankle. When he pulls me to my feet, that throbbing becomes a shooting pain. I howl.

“Is your ankle twisted?” he asks, settling me back down. He seems reluctant at first and blushes again, but eventually he gently places his fingers on either side of my ankle, moving upward. At one point, the pain is so bad I whimper.

“I think so,” I say. “I am officially a moron.”

He reaches down and picks me up. He hefts me into his arms easily, as if I’m just a bag of groceries. “I’m taking you home.”

That sounds just fine to me. “But I live a mile away,” I say, embarrassed.

“Not at all,” he answers. It’s a hot day, and his breathing isn’t labored, so I relax a little, even though I still feel like a goober. “I just hope it is not broken.”

“Let’s not overreact,” I say. “I’ll be fine.”

He carries me the entire way without so much as getting red in the face. I hand him my keys and he holds me up with one arm while opening the front door, then lifts me easily up the stairs. I’m about to direct him where to go, but he never hesitates; he steps to the right and twists open the door to my room, without a word. A weird sensation creeps over me as he lays me in my bed, lifts the sheets out from under me, and covers me. I’m only marginally aware of my hot-pink thong panties lying on the shag carpet, near his feet. How did he know which bedroom was mine?

“Thanks,” I say, nonchalantly reaching down and sweeping the panties under my bed. That’s when I notice my old Zac Efron poster, across the room, framed by my posters of the Eiffel Tower and Big Ben. I’ve been meaning to tear it down ever since I started dating Griffin, but now it hangs there, in all its glory, a testament to my lameness. Strangely, though, Eron seems to be focused completely on me.

“Not at all. I will telephone the management of the soda fountain and tell them of this unfortunate incident.”

“You mean, you’re not going in?”

He shakes his head. “And who would play nurse to you? I think you need to stay off that ankle.”

“No, really, I’m fine….”

He smiles. “I insist.”

I settle back in the pillows. “You really don’t have to.”

“Julia …,” he says, wagging a finger at me to say, Stop arguing.

“Fine. Um, I think my mom has some soda in the fridge. No egg creams, unfortunately.”

Eron laughs, his eyes never leaving mine. They’re focused in such a way that makes me a little queasy. Or maybe that’s just the heat. Or maybe it’s that right then, I realize that Eron doesn’t seem to take notice of his surroundings at all, as if he’s not interested. Or as if he’s already seen my bedroom a thousand times before.

“You’re Italian, is that right?” my mom says, inspecting Eron as she ladles gazpacho into his bowl. A little of it spills onto the table.

He nods politely.

I hope Eron realizes what he’s in for. My mom could make the most hardened of criminals weep. Add my father, and it’s past cruel and unusual. If Eron thought my questioning was harsh, he may end up jumping from something very high at the end of this meal. That’s why I only brought Griffin around my parents once. Only once.

My mom is smiling sweetly, but that’s just one of her tactics: make them think she’s on their side, then strike. “Do I know your parents?”

“Mom …,” I groan.

“They’re … deceased, ma’am,” he says.

She purses her lips. I wait for her to offer condolences but that would reveal she has a heart and shift the power into his court. “So where do you live?”

“With my brother. On Hart Avenue.”

“Hart?” She turns to me and glares. I can read her mind: So did he have anything to do with the $1,200 repair bill for the RAV4? I just smile sheepishly and shrug. “Are you in school?”

“Not any longer,” he says.

“You’ve graduated?”

“I … left school, after eighth grade,” he says. “I needed to find a job.”

My dad nearly chokes on his soup. “But … school is very important!” he chimes in, like a public service announcement. My mom’s eyes narrow in disgust. Normally she’d have pity for a guy whose parents were dead and who had to drop out of school to get a job, but because her only child brought him home to dinner, because he’s a guy and who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men, he’s bad. I kick her under the table. She turns to me. I try to communicate telepathically: You are not interrogating a terrorist. Stop with the third degree.

She seems to get the picture, but then my dad starts in. “What are your plans for the future?”

“Dad,” I mutter, scooping the soup into my spoon and letting it dribble back into my bowl. My mom is always trying random recipes she gets from various shady sources; this “gazpacho” idea came from the back of a can of lima beans and tastes like water. “Stop.” I mean, questions about his future? Please. I see dinner in our future. And possibly me lunging across the table and gouging out my father’s eyes with my spoon.

Eron smiles and wipes his mouth with a napkin. “I am interested in going back to school,” he says, unwavering. He takes another sip of the soup. “I’d like to go back for architecture.”

I stop trying to telekinetically murder my parents, and stare at him, forgetting I’m holding my spoon. It falls to the table with a loud clatter. “Whoops,” I say as green goo splashes across the table and onto the front of my hoodie. But come on, trying to butter me up by pretending to have the same interests as me? Please.

I take a napkin and start to wipe up the mess, and then I realize something…. Did I ever tell him that that was what I was going to major in at college? That I had dreams of designing buildings, too? I don’t think I did. He just goes right on slurping his soup, not looking for a reaction from me. I think he’s serious.

“Mrs. Devine, this soup is delicious,” he says earnestly.

My dad and I both gape at him, then halfheartedly agree, just to be polite. The soup is good? For what? Considering that his apartment was littered with days of crusty old cereal bowls, I guess he isn’t too much of a culinary expert himself.

My mom beams and doesn’t say a word. I don’t think anyone has complimented a meal of hers since before she was married. Even better, he asks for seconds. Eron has silenced the beast. Score.

Afterward, I hobble down the hallway and Eron sets me up on the couch, in front of the television. He lifts my foot and props a pillow under it. I get the feeling he’s played nurse before, because his touch is gentle. Just like with the kiss last night, everywhere he touches begins to tremble. I hope he can’t see what a bowl of Jell-O I am around him.

“Can I have the remote, please?” I ask him.

He tilts his head, looking perplexed. “The …?”

“Remote,” I say, pointing toward the television. It’s sitting there, right on top of the entertainment center, plain as can be, and yet when he walks there, he fidgets for a moment, clearly unsure. Then he picks it up and hands it to me. “Thanks. Want to watch House with me?”

He purses his lips. “Watch the house? Is something going to happen to it?”

“You don’t watch much TV, do you?”

The show starts. He shakes his head and sits down on the couch beside me. Instantly, he’s enraptured. Some kid is having a convulsion on an airplane. Eron’s eyes bulge. I can almost hear his heart beating, even from a cushion’s length away. The kid flops around a little in the narrow aisle, white foam dribbling from his chin, and then it cuts to the opening credits. I don’t think Eron has taken a breath since the show began. He turns to me. “That was … terrifying.”

“But satisfying,” I point out.

He nods and leans against the back of the sofa, making himself comfortable. “Will we find out what is plaguing that poor child?”

“Yep. At about eight-fifty-nine.”

“Oh.” He reaches into the pocket of his jeans and pulls out a long silver chain. I expect a wallet to be attached to it, but instead, he flips open this very elegant pocket watch and inspects it, then winds it a few times. “I probably should be going.”

“Wow, that’s cool,” I say, reaching for it. He hands it to me and I turn it over in my hands. “My dad has one of these. It was his grandfather’s. Who did this belong to?”

He shrugs. “It’s mine. Mama bought it for me when I turned fifteen.”

“Oh. I didn’t know they still sold these. Cool.” I inspect it, then awkwardly say, “I’m sorry about your parents. Seems like they were really cool.”

He nods, sadness in his eyes. “Mama was a good woman. Papa died when I was five. My stepfather was …” He cringes. “Not a nice man.”

“Oh,” I say, not sure how to respond.

“He … killed my mother,” he says.

My jaw drops. “What?”

“A long time ago. He was drinking,” he mumbles. An awkward silence follows, during which I realize that that was why he was so filled with rage over Mr. Anderson’s drunkenness at the party. A long time ago. His mother gave him the watch when he turned fifteen. He can’t be more than eighteen now. Three years isn’t really a long time when it comes to the death of a parent. Maybe he’s just saying that to make things less awkward, like when I lie and say, “I’m fine,” whenever anyone asks how I’m doing. A small smile creeps onto his face. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be so morbid.”

I’m about to hand it back to him, but I stop when I notice something engraved in the cover. Geronimo DeMarchelle, Happy Birthday, Love, Mama. And the date, written out: September thirteenth. “Oh, wow, your birthday is the same as my parents’ anniv—”

I stop. Because that’s when I see the year. There’s something off about it. At first I’m thinking, Okay, he got it in ’08, not very long ago. But then it hits me. It’s not 2008. It’s …

He pries the watch quickly from my fingers and stuffs it back into his pocket.

“Can I see that again?” I motion for him to hand it over. He shuffles in his seat and suddenly becomes absorbed in a television commercial for dish detergent. “Did that say … 1908?”

He doesn’t answer.

Okay, well, it’s got to be a misprint. What other explanation could there be? “Why didn’t you tell the engraver they screwed up?”

He looks at me. “I … I just didn’t realize at the time.”

“Oh. That sucks.” Back on the television, House is ranting. I watch for a few minutes, then I remember. The weird outfit Eron was wearing when I first met him. The way he talks. The fact that a remote control is a foreign concept to him. He acts like he just arrived in a time machine.

Maybe it wasn’t a misprint.

He turns to me. “Yes?”

It’s only then that I realize I’m staring at him, my mouth half open. I clamp it shut and pull an afghan over the goose bumps on my arms. “Um. Just wondering if you would like some … um, Cheez-Its.”

He wrinkles his nose. “Pardon?”

I gulp. Lack of Cheez-It recognition. Not a good sign. “Maybe some Oreos?”

I mean, everyone has to know Milk’s Favorite Cookie, right?