At the 99-cent store two doors down, they wandered the aisles looking for a toy section, and found a bunch of weird-looking Dora stuff and some wooden figures that came with markers for coloring. There was a whole shelf of Barbie-like dolls called Defa Lucy, but nothing cube shaped and black, not even a Rubik’s Cube.

Eden kept moving, up and down aisles and ended up in photo frames and bad framed art. Then saw it.

“Here,” Eden said.

She reached for a small photo cube with pictures of a random family on four sides. “We’ll just put black paper on all sides, and then you’ll say you were going to fill it with pictures as a present for your girlfriend.”

“I don’t have a girlfriend,” Marwan said slowly with some confusion, like he was this close to adding, Do I? And is it you?

Eden had found the arts-and-crafts aisle and picked up black construction paper. To answer him, she held up her phone and rested her head on his shoulder and snapped a selfie of them, then said, “You do now. Come on, we’ll take a few more and have them printed at Walgreens.”

“I don’t know if we have time for this,” Marwan said. He looked at his phone. “My father’s calling me.”

“Pick up,” Eden said. “Tell him you’re on your way.”

Marwan

MARWAN

“What’s going on? Where have you been?” his father asked. He was flanked by two policemen in the foyer of their home. Marwan pushed past, like he had nothing to hide or fear.

“I evacuated like everybody else. Then I got scared.”

“Of what?” one of the officers said.

“Being falsely accused. Like it seems I was.”

“Marwan,” one of the officers said. “Can you tell us what happened? The other student. He said you had a bomb.”

“But it wasn’t a bomb.” He took the decoy cube from his backpack and put it on the kitchen table. “It’s a photo cube.”

“What were you doing with it? In the bathroom?”

“I was about to put photos in it. To surprise a … friend.”

“The student said he saw numbers on it. Red numbers. Like a countdown.”

“I can’t explain that,” Marwan said. “Maybe some weird reflection.”

The cops looked unconvinced.

“Where would I get a bomb?” Marwan said. “And honestly, with everything that’s been going on with us—with the restaurant—I’m offended by the accusation that I’m a terrorist. It’s ridiculous. Speaking of which, how’s the case going? You know, finding the people who have repeatedly vandalized my family’s restaurant?”

The cops shrugged at each other. “We’ll see if we can get you an update.”

“I’ll believe it when it happens.”

No one seemed to know what to do or say next.

“Are we done here?” Marwan asked.

“Where are the photos?” one cop said.