“Okay. Here’s how it happened. My dad first met my mom through a mutual friend and was really impressed. He knew she was from Puerto Rico, so to impress her, he found a novel written in Spanish at a used bookshop and took it to the library. He sat a few tables over from where he knew she liked to study and just waited for her to show up and take notice. It took three days of him visiting that same table for his plan to work. When she did finally notice him sitting there, his nose buried in a Spanish novel, she immediately called him out, sure he didn’t speak a word of Spanish, much less read it. He admitted she was right, said he’d only been trying to impress her and get her attention, then he asked her to dinner. She accepted, and the rest is history.”

“You have to admire your father’s persistence.”

“He said he never doubted for a second. She was it. He just had to be patient enough for her to figure it out too.”

“Did you read the book when you carried it to your tree?” Simon asked. I loved that he called it “my tree,” just like I had. “A Thousand Years of Solitude is some pretty heavy reading for a little girl.”

“I didn’t. Not until I was much older. But now it’s one of my favorites. Because it’s brilliant but also because it’s a part of my history.”

“It’s one of my favorites too. I’ve never read it in Spanish though.”

“I’ve read both. Hard to say which I love more. The translation was beautifully done.”

“Do you still have it? Your dad’s book?”

I frowned, holding my hand to my heart. “Now we must tread carefully. This is hard, hard to speak of.”

“I’m not sure I want you to go on.”

“I left it on the subway in New York.”

“Oh! That’s painful.”

“It still kills me to think about it.”

“I can imagine. Did it bother your dad when you lost the book?”

“Not at all. He says the book was simply a means to an end and he’d rather hold on to Mom than some book. I think it was just my childish romantic brain that gave it significance.”

He shook his head. “I don’t think it was childish at all.”

I loved the way talking to Simon made me feel—like I was interesting and deep and . . . valued. But it was also making my head hurt. It seemed as though every time I felt convinced Simon wasn’t an issue, some conversation between us, some look or gesture would scramble my insides all over again, dashing my certainty into a thousand different pieces. It was exhausting.