The commercial block near Valcrest’s east gate was the type of small, intentionally local shopping area that developed around universities. It featured bookshops stocked with strong selections related to the nearby academic departments, cafés that catered to the needs of time-strapped students, and specialty stores that addressed unique local demands.

Ellie moved through the area with the ease of someone who had frequented it for six months and formed strong opinions about everything it offered.

"The bookshop first," she said. "Then I want to show you something."

"What something?"

"You’ll see," she said. "Stop asking questions and walk faster."

"You haven’t changed at all," Mike said.

"I have," she said. "I’m taller and my boobies are bigger right?"

"You were always taller than average," Mike said. "And yes, I noticed."

"I forgot that Ellie is the type of girl who doesn’t get offended by that kind of joke."

"I was exactly average," she said. "I checked. Multiple times. I was very invested in being average height in the fifth grade for reasons I no longer remember."

"You wanted to be the same height as the boy you liked," Mike said.

She stopped walking.

He kept walking. One step ahead of her, then two.

"Mike," she said.

"Yeah?"

"How do you remember that?" she said.

He turned around. She was standing on the pavement looking at him with the expression of someone who had been startled by a memory they thought only they had.

"I paid attention," he said. "I told you. I pay attention to everything."

"I was ten," she said.

"I know," he said. "And you were very obvious about it."

"You stood next to him every time there was a line." Mike referred to ’him’ as himself.

She stared at him.

"I was so angry when you moved," she said, slowly, like someone watching something surface from a long way down. "When your family relocated, you just disappeared."

"I didn’t understand why I was so angry specifically..." Ellie exhaled. "I thought I was upset about you leaving in general."

"You weren’t," Mike said.

"No," she said. "I wasn’t."

She looked at the pavement for a moment. "I think I was angry because you left before I figured out what I was feeling. And then there was nothing I could do with it."

"You found somewhere to put it," Mike said. "Eventually."

She glanced up at him. "Stanley’s street," she murmured softly.

"Yeah," Mike said.

She started walking again, and the energy shifted back toward the afternoon. But not entirely. Not completely.

"You knew everything that was happening when we were kids," she said. "And you never said any of it."

"I said some of it," Mike said.

"Not to me," she said.

"I said it where it counted," Mike said.

She looked at him sideways. "Where did it count?"

"To Stan," Mike said. "When it mattered."

She seemed to process the information for a few steps. "What did you say to Stan?"

"When you were twelve," Mike said, "he was going to walk home with the group that went past the park and not with the group that went past your street."

"I told him he should go past your street."

Ellie stopped again.

"You didn’t," she said.

"He’d been working up to asking you something for three weeks," Mike said. "He just needed to be on the right street."

"That was—" She put her hand over her mouth for a moment. Then lowered it. "That’s why he walked me home that day."

"Yes," Mike said.

"That’s—" She shook her head slowly. "That’s the day everything started between us."

"That walk... He finally said what he’d been thinking."

"I know," Mike said. "That’s why I sent him down your street."

She looked at him with an expression that was hard to read, which was unusual because Ellie Harper had never been difficult to read. The expression on her face resembled that of someone who had just received information that changed their understanding of a situation.

"You set us up," she said. "At twelve years old."

"I pointed him in a direction," Mike said. "He did the rest."

"Why?" she said.

"If you—" She stopped.

He waited.

"If you noticed things," she said, more carefully now. "If you paid attention... Then you must have known that I—"

She stopped again.

"That you liked me," Mike said. "Yes. I knew."

She looked at the pavement for a moment. "And you still sent Stanley down my street."

"Stanley was the right person to be there," Mike said. "I knew that too."

She was quiet for a long moment. Then she looked up, and her expression had changed to something simpler, less complicated.

"And now you’re here," she said. "Twelve years later."

"Now I’m here," Mike said.

"Twelve years later," she said again, like the repetition was doing something for her.

"Come on," Mike said. "You were going to show me something."

She glanced at him for another moment, then let out a sigh and began to walk. But it wasn’t a complete return to what had been. Not entirely.

...

The bookshop had a good architecture section that Ellie went through with the professional attention of someone who read reviews before spending anything. Mike found a text on comparative trade regulation that he added to the stack he was building.

"You actually read those," she said.

"Reading is efficient," Mike said.

"You sound like Stanley," she said, and a moment later, it seemed as if she had heard herself.

"Is that bad?" Mike said.

"No," she said. "It’s just—"

She looked at the shelf. "You say it, and it sounds different."

"How does it sound when Stan says it?"

She was quiet for a moment.

"Like a report," she said. "You say it, and it sounds like a preference."

"What’s the difference?"

She looked at him. "A report is what you’re doing. A preference is who you are."

Mike looked at her for a long moment. She held the look and then looked away first.

Down the aisle, an older man was trying to reach something from the top shelf. Mike crossed over, reached it without effort, and handed it down. The man thanked him and moved on.

Ellie was watching him when he came back.

"You did that in school too," she said.

"Reached things?" Mike said.

"Noticed when someone needed something before they asked," she said. "Without making a thing of it."

She tilted her head. "You were twelve and you were already doing that."

"Habit," Mike said.

"From where?"

"Because of paying attention," Mike said. "Same answer every time."

"Did a lot of girls like you?" she said. The question came out casual, but there was something underneath it that wasn’t.

’She’s trying, huh...?’

"Some," Mike said.

"Before you moved," she said. "Emma Vance. And Priya."

"Priya," Mike agreed. "And Claire, briefly."

"Claire too," Ellie said.

"God." She laughed, short and genuine. "You collected them without doing anything."

"I wasn’t collecting," Mike said.

"You didn’t have to," she said. "They came to you. Even Emma had very specific opinions about the boys she liked."

"I was neither of the things Emma liked," Mike said.

"You were both," she said. "Just quietly."

She looked at a book without seeing it. "I was fourteen, and I thought I understood you. I thought you were my friend, and I knew who you were."

"You did know who I was," Mike said.

"I knew part of it," she said. "I didn’t know you were watching everyone that carefully."

She put the book back. "I didn’t know you’d already been making sense of all of us."

"Not deciding," Mike said. "Noticing."

"What’s the difference?"

"Deciding means you change what happens," Mike said. "Noticing means you just know it."

"Except for the street," she said. "You changed what happened there."

"Once," Mike said. "Because it was the right thing and I could see it clearly."

She looked at him. "Do you see things clearly now?"

"Usually," Mike said.

"What do you see when you look at me?" she said.

She said it the way she did most things—directly, without making it small. But she said it quietly, which was not always how she did things.

Mike looked at her. The bookshop had the specific warm light of late afternoon filtered through old windows, and Ellie Harper was standing in it the way she had always stood in whatever room she occupied, with her full attention pointed outward.

"I’ll tell you later," Mike said. "Come on."

"You were going to show me something."