Oscar stared at me for a second, then he smiled like he’d made a decision. Instead of telling me what it was, he took my hand and uncurled my fingers, one after another, and pressed his palm to mine. I watched him as our fingers slipped together and folded shut. It was so quiet, I swore I could hear his pulse catching up to mine as we sat together, perfectly still.

This was limbo, but here in the courtyard, I didn’t mind it. We’d fall one way or the other, but for now we were both friends holding hands and . . . not. The nicest imaginable version of Schrödinger’s cat.

I lost all sense of time until his thumb crept up to nudge the watch on my wrist, Mom’s birthday gift to me from two years ago. I wore it every day and never looked at it. But Oscar’s eyes were sharpening, his face falling.

“It’s one? How is it one?”

“Is that . . . late?”

“Um.” He straightened, perching to stand. “How long do you think it’ll take to get home?”

I got up, looking out to the street. “We can grab a taxi. What do you need to be back for?”

“An interview.” He brushed off his shorts as he stood. “It’s not till one fifteen, but Ms. Visser said she wanted to prep me.” He laughed uneasily. “Whatever that means?”

“For the alumni magazine, or . . . ?”

“I actually have no idea.”

I stepped onto the sidewalk, feeling my posture cement as the wall of city noise rose around me like the roar of an oncoming army. I went funny like this every time I left my house, skin hardening into armor. I’d often wondered if every New Yorker felt this way. Oscar sure looked tense as we rode silently in the back of a taxi, but that was probably more to do with this mystery interview.

As we got to the stoop, Oscar’s phone started to ring. The Farzone theme song—TJ calling from his gamer chair.

We both smiled, then I reached idly for Oscar’s pocket. It wasn’t until I’d handed him the phone, watching him press the button to mute it, that I realized how familiar a gesture it was—the kind of thing a girlfriend would do. Not whatever I was.

I peered up at Oscar, testing this teeny-tiny boundary, hoping I hadn’t made him uncomfortable. There was surprise shining in his eyes—but warmth drowning it out. He stepped closer.

The front door swung open. I jumped back, surprised to see Nora welcoming us like we’d teleported to her house in Gramercy Park.

She looked thrown too. Her eyes darted between the two of us, widened, sparked, narrowed, all in the space it took me to squeak, “Nora! Hey!”