Page 9 of It's a Love Story

I say hello and shake his hand. “It’s not easy,” I say with a smile.

“Because she’s insane,” Dan says.

“Can you see why Dan never has a girlfriend?” Pedro asks me.

“Yes, no mystery there,” I say.

Dan laughs like that’s both true and fine. “We’re going to Maud’s real quick.”

Pedro gives me yikes eyes. “Oh, he really does hate you.”

“Wheatgrass,” I say. “Tell me it’s not wheatgrass.”

“You’ll be begging for wheatgrass,” Pedro says.

I find out what he means when we are seated on opposite sides of a picnic table with an order of potato skins and two lemonades between us.

“They’re delicious,” he says. “Try.”

I pick one up and take a bite, and the grease rolls down my wrist. It is a celebration of starch and cheese and bacon the likes of which my mouth has never known.

My bliss must show on my face because he says, “See?”

“I see.” I take a second napkin and wipe my face. “I had you pegged as a guy who would think cheese is murder.”

“Yep, you’ve really got me all figured out.” He leans toward me, gesturing with a potato skin. “So tell me why you’re stalking me. You want ideas for Quinlan’s song?”

I’m not ready to ask for help, so I take another bite of my greasy potato and use another napkin. “Are you a painter? Like is this the Bruce Wayne to your Batman?”

He laughs a little, a two on the Richter scale. “I paint, or I have painted. My degree is in photography. I sell prints online when I’m between jobs.” I’ve never sat like this, across a table from him, and the navy blue of his eyes is deeper than I remember. His lashes are jet black like his hair—it’s all so dramatic. He takes another potato skin and replaces a fallen piece of bacon on top. “I have a darkroom in my apartment, and the chemicals will probably kill me by the time I’m sixty, so there’s no need to save for retirement. It’s a pretty solid plan.”

I laugh. I don’t mean to. I want to take the laugh back, but it’s gotten me. “Yes, death is a sure path to financial independence. You’re a total catch.”

The view of the ocean is behind him, beyond the boardwalk. People are skating by. The sun is getting lower so his face is in shadow. He’s completely still, and there’s so much motion behind him, it’s mesmerizing, like he’s in time-lapse.

“Jane,” he says, and I come to.

“Yeah, so can we talk about this movie?”

“I don’t have a tiger,” he says.

“I think the tiger thing was a joke,” I say.

“When I said I didn’t think it was commercial, I meant it in a good way.”

“I bet you’re terrible at breaking up with people.”

“I am,” he says. “How would you know that?”

“Just a hunch. How was it in a good way?”

He’s quiet for a second, and the white noise of the boardwalk—rollerbladers, voices, gulls—intensifies. “The loud movies with the explosions and superheroes, they sell tickets because they’re an escape. We don’t have to think about our own lives when we watch them. We can hide in the noise. But it’s the quiet movies that make room for us to look at ourselves. People cooking, teaching, gardening. They’re quiet things, but they’re the things that move us. And people, mostly, are afraid of the quiet.”

“Yes.” It just comes out.

“Wait, did you just agree with me?”

“Even a stopped clock is right twice a day, Dan.”

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