After a long time, Jake broke the silence, shaking off the light around his face with a sudden shake of his head. “What about you—how did you hear about it when your friend died?”

She pursed her lips, astonished that he had remembered. Once the initial surprise had passed, she had to try hard to think of the answer. It had been a long time since she had allowed herself to think about that particular moment—not since it had happened, in fact.

“In school, the day after,” she finally said, after a long pause. She noticed that her voice didn’t tremble, though she had expected it to. “It was while we were in high school. She got hit by a car. I actually saw the ambulance coming as my bus was pulling out of the parking lot that day, but I had no way of knowing it had to do with her. I even called her that evening—we used to talk every night—but that day she had mentioned something about going out to dinner with her parents, so I didn’t think it was strange when she didn’t call me back. She died in the hospital that night, but no one thought to tell me. The principal made the announcement over the loudspeaker the next morning, right after the Pledge of Allegiance. He didn’t even know how to pronounce her name.”

Jake waited a moment before asking her, “What was her name again?”

“Naomi. Naomi Landsmann,” Leora answered. This time she was the one watching the ceiling, feeling Jake’s eyes on her ear.

“She was a close friend?”

“The best I ever had,” Leora said, and though she had never used those words to describe Naomi before, hearing herself say them seemed to make them come true. For a moment, lying on her bed, she thought of telling him more about Naomi, about her drawings, about her way of seeing things, and then about her grandfather and his slides, but the sense of urgency faded. She suddenly knew that she could tell him another time, anytime—maybe tomorrow, maybe the next day, maybe even years from now. The present moment seemed to float above her head, buoyed up by a light and gleaming future. They were both silent for a moment, and Leora closed her eyes. Her bed felt like a boat on the open ocean, caressed by waves.