Page 33 of Wait for Me

“True. I guess I meant that we aren’t as dull and insipid as we once were three years ago.”

“Speak for yourself, Logan.” Marie chuckled.

They entered the ice cream shop, crowded with wide-eyed kids and their befuddled parents. Someone remarked about not eating ice cream so early in the morning. Someone else said they were on vacation, as if that was an excuse.

“Are you getting anything?” Logan eyed the wall-to-wall list of items to choose from.

“I don’t know,” Marie replied.

“I want everything!” Jonas jumped up and down. “Daddy, buy this ice cream shop!”

Logan and Marie laughed. A few people in line joined in.

“Kids,” someone said.

“We came all the way here to eat ice cream, can you believe it?” Logan remarked.

Several of the parents nodded. “Yeah. Might as well stay at home.”

“Exactly what I thought.” Logan inched forward in the line.

“I can’t see the board, Daddy.” Jonas had his arms straight up.

Logan lifted him to his shoulders. He wondered what good that would do, since Jonas could barely read, even though he could now see the board above all the other heads.

Marie was on her phone. Logan was about to confiscate it like she did his, when she showed the screen to Jonas.

“They have an app with photos of all the cups and cones,” Marie explained. “You want to see what they can make you?”

Jonas nodded. His little index finger scrolled the page up, as if it was the most natural thing to do.

“When I was his age, I turned pages in a physical book,” Logan said.

“I know. His digital generation is so many light years ahead of us,” Marie replied.

“I want this…and this…and this…” Point. Scroll. Swipe.

When they reached the front of the line, the crowd did not thin out.

“I’ll find a table,” Marie said.

“Tell me what you want.” Logan wondered if she…

“I always get the same thing.”

So she hadn’t changed. She still only ordered sorbet. “Any flavor?”

“Surprise me.”

Surprise me?Now that surprised Logan. “Okay.”

Some minutes later Marie was waiting, wiping a round table by the window that had just been vacated by a messy family. Logan arrived with more napkins on a tray of ice cream for him and Jonas, and sorbet for Marie.

“What did you get me?” Marie pointed to a chair for Jonas to sit on.

“Taste and see.” Logan wanted to know if she liked it.

Before she responded, Marie glanced at the entrance to the ice cream shop. Logan’s back was facing it, so he turned to look.

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