“Wait, did he take your money?” Frankie asked.

“Oh . . . well,” Joni said stoically, then stared at the floor.

Frankie leveled Ezra with a look she knew he’d understand. He reached into his pocket, first removing the keys, then pulling out his wallet. He fingered through the billfold, and sure enough, Frankie noted that there must have been at least seven hundred dollars, probably more, in there. Ezra’s swollen eyes managed to pop just enough that Frankie knew Joni was telling the truth.

“How much?” Frankie asked.

“No, no, really, that’s not why—” Joni started.

“Do you know what this man does for a living?” Frankie said.

“Stop,” Ezra cut her off.

“He’s a high-powered Manhattan attorney at one of the top law firms in the city. Have you seen Ally McBeal? Like that. But . . . less singing.” Frankie realized she wasn’t making her point, but she forged ahead. “And you’re here, slinging coffee, which is great for your work ethic but not for your tuition payments. Let him pay you back.”

“Seventy-five. He took about seventy-five.” Joni shrugged. “But it’s ok. I got out a little too far over my skis. I can be a cocky bastard.”

“Coincidentally, so can he.” Frankie reached over, took Ezra’s wallet and handed Joni five twenties. “That’s your tip for today. Thank you.”

Ezra sighed and then picked up the keys.

“I don’t suppose these belong to you?”

Joni shook her head.

“And I don’t suppose you know the people I was with last night? It’s all . . . kind of fuzzy,” Ezra said. “Neither of us remember much.”

Joni scrunched up her face with no judgment. In the corner of the shop, the stereo speakers quieted, then a new song started. Frankie immediately recognized the opening clang: “We Are the World.” She wondered if the song stirred up the same memory for Ezra—that first winter break she’d gone home with him to the Philadelphia suburbs. Ezra’s mom was in remission but due for scans after the holiday, and he was understandably jittery. Ezra was often jittery, but this was a lot even for him. Frankie wanted to soothe him, but she wasn’t used to caretaking, didn’t really know how to, since she didn’t exactly have exemplary role models, and she was barely used to taking care of herself. She hadn’t yet told him about her child prodigy years, about the mess of her youth, which is how she’d come to think of it; about the fact that she could hear the notes in any piece of music and just somehow see them. But this song came on the radio as they were driving in his beat-up Jeep, and she’d started singing, because if Ezra could be vulnerable, maybe she could be too.

And she had looked at him and said: “You trade off with me.”

Ezra scoffed like she was crazy. “I can’t sing. Do you not know that about me? I really can’t sing.”

“Anyone can sing,” she said. Then, as if to demonstrate, she proceeded to belt Paul Simon’s line pitch-perfectly.