“I don’t play anymore.” I watched the sunlight strobe between rooftops as we walked. “I don’t know why he told you that.”

“Have you gone back to wind instruments?” His face dropped at my blank reaction. “I saw the photo. In your house. The piccolo . . . ?”

“Oh.” I groaned. “Ha. No. That was just for the, um . . . it was an ad campaign for Lincoln Center. They had a bunch of kids for different areas of the arts. Shakespeare, ballet. Like we were the future, la-la-la. Most of the models were actually studying, but for my shoot, they just handed me random instruments. Violin, French horn. I never played a note. So . . . yeah.”

Where were we even going? A light was changing—I veered us randomly left.

“You’re a model. Whoa.”

“For two hours when I was ten. I’m retired now.”

“Congratulations on your retirement. Are you embarking on a twilight career?” Oscar asked. “Golf? Mahjong?”

His voice was light, but I sensed sincerity in the question. What could I answer? I’m going shopping for party clothes later this week!

“I’m going to be an arborist.”

“Word!” Oscar skipped ahead and walked backward. “You’re branching out, then.”

A laugh caught in my throat. “Wow.”

“What’s your favorite tree?”

I stared.

“If you had one tree to look at for the rest of your life, what would it be?” He squinted, thinking. “I’d pick the dogwood.”

“Oak. The mighty . . . oak, I was kidding about the whole arborist—”

Oscar fell into step to stage-whisper, “I got that.”

“Although, who knows? I don’t not like trees?” I wasn’t ready to talk about the park and Nora and parties for the greater good. “I’m just . . . between passions right now.”

“So what you’re saying is you’ve got free time.”

I blinked up at him.

His eyes flashed as he nodded. “Good to know.”

I wasn’t sure how much to read into that, how much to react, what to do with my arms, so I crossed them and started blabbering, “So hey, I think I should lay this out there—I’m not like the rest of my family? They’re wizards, I’m a squib. I tried to be magical. It didn’t work out. I’m not complaining! Just the way it is. So now all I know is . . . I’m going to try something different. And, like, tackle it. So.”

“I like that.”

“You like what?” I glanced at him, cheeks burning.

“Different. Tackling.” He shrugged. “You.”

“You hardly know me.”

“Okay, yes, true.” He stopped walking, turned to face me. “I guess I mean I like you as a thing.”

“A thing!” I burst out laughing. It couldn’t have been what he meant. Then my gaze drifted past him to the hectic intersection where we were standing.

“I like that someone like you exists,” he went on. “You are . . . an object of interest.”