The Geography of You and Me

“I think maybe he called in—”

“Sick?” Sam said with raised eyebrows. “No.”

Owen shook his head. “Then it was a vacation day.…”

“After only a couple of weeks?” Sam asked, then flashed a smile that came off as more of a leer. “I don’t think so. No way I’d have cleared that even if he’d bothered asking. Which he didn’t.”

“I’m really sorry.…”

Sam waved this away. “Is he back now, or is he still sipping mai tais on the beach?”

Owen glanced over at George, who was now at the front desk and who gave him a helpless shrug.

“He’s back,” he said through gritted teeth. “But he’s not feeling well.”

“Well, give him a message for me, will you?” Sam leaned in a little closer. “Tell him the water’s back but not the pressure. And since he’s already on fairly thin ice,” he said, demonstrating with his thumb and index finger, only the tiniest sliver of space between the two, “he might want to see about fixing it tonight. Okay?”

There was nothing to do but nod. Sam gave him a little pat on the shoulder before turning to walk back over to the desk, and as soon as he did, Owen hurried through the mailroom and down the stairs, biting back his anger at Sam and his frustration at Dad.

It was impossible to know what he’d been thinking, simply taking off for the day without asking after only a few weeks on the job. It was stupid and completely shortsighted.

But when he opened the door to the apartment, his eyes fell on the kitchen counter, where he’d seen the bouquet of flowers just a couple of nights before, and something about the memory made him feel like crying.

He thought about what Sam had said. There was no way his father would have gotten the day off even if he’d asked.

But Owen understood why he had to go.

He went out there for Mom; to stand in the place where they’d first met, the rough wood of the boardwalk beneath their feet and the salty smell of the ocean at their backs. He’d gone to relive that day. And he’d gone to say good-bye.

He’d gone there for her.

And then he’d walked all the way back for him.

From down the hall, Owen heard Dad call his name, his voice hoarse. In the bedroom, he was sitting up now, propped against a couple of pillows. When he saw Owen, he reached over and switched on the bedside lamp with a grin.

“Ta-da,” he said. “Electricity.”

For a moment, Owen thought of not telling him about Sam, of letting the night pass without fixing the water pumps. He knew what it would mean—they’d have to leave the building. They’d probably even leave New York. The two of them could drive out west, find some place better suited for them, a place with more sky and fewer people. Maybe they’d even retrace the route his parents had taken all those years ago. Maybe, in that way, Owen would be able to say good-bye, too.

But standing there in the doorway, he knew he couldn’t do it. He had to give this a chance, if only for his dad. It was what his mom would have wanted. And it was the right thing to do.

Besides, after last night, Owen wasn’t so sure he was ready to leave New York behind anyway. At least not yet.

Instead, they would haul the heavy red toolbox into the utilities room, where Dad would sit on the cool concrete floor with a glass of water and show Owen what to do. Together, they would figure out a way to make it work. They would figure out a way to make this work.

Owen crossed the threshold of the room, stepping into the pool of light from the lamp, and handed over one of the water bottles.

“So,” he said, his voice bright. “Now that we’ve got electricity, think you’re up to conjuring some water, too?”





7


For the next two days, Lucy got herself out of bed and went to school. She sat through her classes and tolerated her classmates. She looked for Owen each morning and then again each afternoon. And when she didn’t see him, she returned to her apartment, trying not to be disappointed, and ate dinner alone.

Then, on the third day, George appeared at the door to help carry her suitcase downstairs and hail her a cab to the airport.

Just before midnight on the day the lights came back, her parents had finally gotten through to her. Lucy had been asleep already, and when she reached for her phone and saw a jumble of numbers too long to be local, she picked it up.

It was morning in Paris, and her parents were on two separate extensions, wide-awake and talking over each other.

“Lucy,” her dad kept saying. “Luce, are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” she said groggily, sitting up in bed. “Just sleepy.”

“We’ve been trying and trying,” Mom said, her usually clipped accent softened by worry. “You gave us such a fright.”

“I couldn’t get through,” Lucy explained, fully awake now. “The circuits were all busy. But it’s fine. I’m okay.”