“Daddy did a lot of work in the city that wasn’t always popular,” she says dryly. “When we moved, we got an unlisted number.” Her laugh is husky, hollow. “Driving here today I passed through the old neighborhood. Our houses are still there. Mrs. Washington’s house. The park, though it’s been upgraded.”
“You’d go there sometimes by yourself when you needed to clear your head.”
“Like at that age I had so much that needed clearing.” She laughs. “I was never there by myself long, though. You’d always come find me. Sit with me. Not talk, but just swing back and forth. You were such a quiet kid.”
“Not with you.”
“No.” Our gazes lock, cling. “Not with me.”
The silence deepens, but neither of us seem in a hurry to fill it. I soak in this moment, soak in her company, relishing it like the luxury time has proven it to be.
“You remember that old ice cream truck?” she asks after a few more seconds, a smile coming to life on her lips, in her eyes. When she smiles it’s like a sunrise, spreading warmth as it ascends.
“That little song was so creepy now that I think about it.” I chuckle.
“Oh my God, and the driver was creepy. We’re lucky he never snatched us.”
“He always had those orange Push-Ups you liked so much. Those were your favorites.”
She tilts her head, smiling as she considers me. “How do you even remember that?”
“I remember everything, Tru.”
The amusement in her eyes and the smile on her lips flicker, and she goes silent. I shouldn’t have said that, not like that in a way that reveals just how much those times meant to me. Still mean to me.
“What was mine?” I ask. “My favorite ice cream?”
I just don’t know when to stop. What would it even prove if she remembers?
Her protracted silence tells me she doesn’t.
“Never mind. I wouldn’t expect you to—”
“Nutty Buddy.”
My eyes meet hers in the dimming light, and I’m transported to the night of our first kiss when we promised to always be friends no matter what.
“I should have tried harder to find you.” I shake my head. “I was so caught up in—”
“Moving to an entirely new country?” she interrupts, touching my hand. “I was still here in this one, and high school was rough. Just surviving took all my focus. It’s natural for people to lose touch with friends they knew that young as they start new phases with new people.”
I flip my hand to link our fingers. “Not for us it wasn’t. We should have always been in each other’s lives somehow.”
She hooks our pinkies. “Pact,” she w
hispers.
“Pact.” I nod, holding her stare and her hand. The air between us thrums like a heartbeat. Her lips part on a breath, and it takes all of my restraint not to lean forward, wipe away the lip gloss and kiss her again like I did once before.
“Here you two are.” Mona’s words dent the tension building between us, but nothing could shatter it. “I told you not to monopolize each other, and what do you do as soon as my back is turned?”
Her good-natured smile slips when she sees us holding hands. Her glance bounces between our fingers and our faces. She and Aiko are friends, but I know Ko didn’t talk to her about the break-up before she left. Mona thinks it’s wrong for me to hold Kimba’s hand. By the way Kimba jerks away and the guilty expression on her face, so does she.
Before Mona can voice the question and the disapproval her expression clearly conveys, Noah walks up, balancing three small plates.
“I got ‘em!” he says triumphantly. “Red velvet for you, Kimba.” He passes a plate to her and then another to me. “German chocolate for you, Dad.”
“Thank you, son.”