He catches me looking and a cautious smile overtakes his face. “What?”

“You’re glittering.”

His eyebrows go up. “What?”

“You have…” I consider brushing it away, except I’d need to be about twenty inches taller to do that. Also, I’m pretty sure there’s an unspoken rule that you aren’t supposed to touch strangers’ faces. Although, for a stranger, I’m certainly running into him a lot. “I noticed it down on the street. I think it’s glitter.”

“Oh!” He starts dusting frantically at his hair and face. “I got ambushed by a bunch of little girls. Where is it?”

“Oh, right. I’ve heard about Salem’s little-girl glitter gangs. They sound brutal.”

He laughs and I gesture to my right cheek so he knows where to swipe. “Did I get it?”

Not quite, but I like how it looks, so I nod.

“It’s Simon and Emma’s girls. They have Nova and three little ones. They’re sort of… a lot.” He reaches back and sort of ruffles his hair, an action I’ve seen him do a few times now.

“My dad has triplets. They just turned two,” I offer.

“Whoa. Okay, then, you get it.”

I nod again and that’s all I can muster. For a moment we sit there awkwardly, then Mason gestures to a chair. “Want to sit?”

We drag the chairs to the edge, then sit with our feet propped up on the banister. The sky is putting on quite the show for us. The moon is a perfect silver, and the dark sky feels close and velvety, pinned up by stars. As soon as Mason looks up his whole energy shifts, and suddenly he’s relaxed and alert. “This is great.”

“What is?”

“Moon-viewing conditions.” He rifles around in his backpack, then produces a pair of binoculars “You must be good luck. The conditions are the clearest I’ve seen since I got here.” He extends the binoculars toward me. “Want to look at the moon?”

I fit the binoculars to my eyes, and suddenly it’s like I’m seeing the moon for the first time. It’s rocky and ridged, with deep hollows, the white surface so bright, it’s blinding. It feels calming and grounding, and honestly sort of holy.

I lower them and Mason is smiling at me. “Well?”

“I like looking at the line between light and dark,” I say.

“That’s called the terminator.”

“Really?” I lower the binoculars for a moment to look at him.

He’s smiling now. “When the moon is full, it’s too bright for contrast, so it flattens out all the texture. But right now you can see more of her features.”

“What are the features?” I like how he calls the moon a “her.”

“Craters, dead volcanos. Mountains. Here, look again.”