Page 62

TEN

T he first pulse of dawn is just oozing into the sky as they round the corner onto Cornelia Street, and Eddie slows his pace. He’s picturing Theo, of course, because Cornelia Street is Theo’s street, and suddenly Eddie is seized with anxiety. What would happen if Theo saw him with Francis? Would Theo be jealous? Judgmental? Would he be angry? But then again, Eddie isn’t doing anything wrong. There’s nothing between him and Theo. It’s not like they’ve ever gone out or anything. Why would Theo care at all? Maybe he wouldn’t. But still. Eddie’s mind whirls.

“Where are we going?” Eddie asks, his voice quiet in deference to the silence around them.

“Right up here,” Francis says.

Cornelia is a short street, just a single block long, and there’s no one else out here, so it’s easy to see Patisserie Gaston from the corner, the only storefront on the block with the lights on inside. Eddie’s happy to see the lights, because it means that anyone inside wouldn’t be able to see very clearly outside, so unless Theo comes out, he’ll have no idea that Eddie’s even here. Keep walking, Francis, he thinks. Lead us up and around the corner, onto Bleecker Street, and away from here.

But Francis steps off the curb and into the street, stopping right in the middle of the asphalt, just a few yards from the front door of Patisserie Gaston. He points to the bakery.

Eddie follows Francis’s finger as if he hasn’t stood here before himself, looking at the bakery, looking for Theo. And just like the times before, this time he can see straight through the shop and into the back kitchen, a clear line of sight to the countertop where Theo kneads and rolls and cuts and shapes his dough. And yes, Theo is there, doing just that. Eddie can even see the songbird tattoos, dancing on Theo’s forearms as he rolls and turns and punches the dough.

“See that place?” Francis says.

Eddie swallows. “The bakery?”

“Yes,” Francis says. “You should take a picture of it.”

Eddie turns to Francis, slowly, pretending not to understand, hoping that Francis will lose interest, and they’ll walk on to wherever Francis was going to take him in the first place. “What?”

“A picture. Don’t you have your camera?”

“Yes, I… I do,” Eddie says, stumbling on his words. “But—why? It’s just a bakery.”

“It’s a special place,” Francis says. “Trust me.”

Eddie does trust Francis. So he opens the camera.

“Just the front door?” he asks.

“Yes,” Francis says.

Eddie raises the camera. Through it, he can see Theo even more clearly somehow, his body exactly in the middle of the frame. His mouth is moving, like he’s singing along to something on the radio, or maybe just talking to himself, narrating the process of whatever dough he’s working on.

“Wait,” Francis says before Eddie releases the shutter. “Can I try?”

“Um, okay,” Eddie says, eager to get this done and get off Cornelia Street. He hands the camera to Francis. “You just push this little button here.”

But Eddie’s forgotten that he left the flash function on, and when Francis pushes the button the flash fires, sending a burst of light straight at the glass front door of the bakery. Theo’s head shoots up. Even from here Eddie can see him squinting at the front door. Theo’s shoulders square and the muscles in his neck tense. He grabs his rolling pin and starts walking toward the front door, taking slow steps, tentative, and Eddie, not frightened of Theo but frightened of the impending tornado of humiliation that is about to suck him up, panics.

He takes a flustered step back, and then another, then turns and sprints four more steps to a parked van across the street, an electric delivery van with the Amazon logo. He ducks down to hide. He whisper-shouts to Francis, “Come here!” and beckons him over to hide.

But Francis is not here. All he sees is the camera, lying on its side on the asphalt, a little plastic card protruding from its slot.

Francis is gone.