The memory came back because of the cafeteria pizza.
Rosalie had no idea why.
She was standing in her present-day kitchen scraping something questionable from a plate when the smell of melted cheese and tomato sauce hit her, and suddenly the tile beneath her feet was gone.
So was the kitchen.
She was eleven again.
And Nolan Devereaux had just walked into her classroom.
Nolan transferred into my fifth-grade class on a Tuesday.
I remember because Tuesday meant library.
Library meant forty-five minutes where nobody expected me to talk.
Mrs. Campbell stopped reading announcements when the classroom door opened.
The school secretary stepped in first.
Then Nolan.
Too tall.
Too thin.
Dark hair combed badly to one side, like somebody had tried to make him presentable in the car and lost the fight.
His jacket hung loose through the shoulders.
He looked around the classroom once.
Not at the kids.
At the windows.
The back door.
The hallway.
I noticed because I did the same thing in places I didn’t know.
Mrs. Campbell smiled.
“Everyone, this is Nolan Devereaux. Nolan, there’s an empty seat beside Rosalie.”
Twenty-five heads turned toward me.
Fantastic.
I dropped my eyes to my worksheet.
Nolan walked down the aisle and slid into the desk beside mine.
His chair scraped.
A minute later, while Mrs. Campbell kept talking, he leaned toward me.
“I’m Nolan.”
“I know.”
“You know?”
“She just said your name.”
He was quiet for a second.
“Right.”
I heard him try not to laugh.
At lunch, I carried my tray to my usual spot near the end of the table.
Pizza.
Peas.
Milk.
The pizza looked like somebody had laminated cheese onto cardboard and then changed their mind halfway through.
I picked at it.
A tray landed across from mine.
Nolan sat down.
I looked at all the empty seats.
Then at him.
“What are you doing?”
“Eating.”
“I can see that.”
“Good.”
He opened his milk.
“You can sit anywhere.”
“I know.”
“So why here?”
He took a bite of pizza.
“Because you’re here.”
I stared at him.
A boy named Eric passed with two of his friends and slowed down.
“Why are you sitting with her?”
My shoulders tightened.
Here we go.
Nolan looked at him.
“Because I want to.”
Eric rolled his eyes.
“She doesn’t talk.”
Nolan glanced at me.
“She talks to me.”
Eric shrugged and kept walking.
I looked at Nolan.
“You don’t even know me.”
“I know you hate peas.”
“That’s not knowing me.”
“You draw on your worksheets.”
My hand moved over the sketch in the corner of my paper.
Nolan smiled.
“You finish early, then draw.”
“You stare at people too much.”
“Probably.”
“And you’ve known me for three hours.”
“Long day.”
I tried not to smile.
That apparently amused him even more.
From then on, Nolan sat with me whenever he could.
Lunch.
Library.
Assemblies.
Bus rides when our routes crossed.
He talked enough for both of us, but he also knew when to shut up.
That was different.
Adults treated silence like a broken appliance.
Other kids usually filled it because they liked hearing themselves.
Nolan could sit beside me for ten minutes without saying anything and then suddenly ask whether squirrels knew they were squirrels.
I had no idea what to do with him.
A week later, school let out beneath a gray October sky.
I stood near the curb waiting for Mimi.
Nolan appeared beside me.
I looked at him.
“What?”
“What?”
“Why are you standing here?”
“I’m standing.”
“Your bus is over there.”
“I know.”
I squinted at him.
“You missed it.”
“Maybe.”
“On purpose?”
He kicked a pebble into the gutter.
“Maybe.”
Before I could ask why, Mimi’s old Buick pulled toward the curb.
The passenger window lowered.
“Rosalie!”
Then she saw Nolan.
Her eyes narrowed.
I opened the back door.
“This is Nolan.”
Mimi leaned toward the window.
“Bonjour, Nolan.”
He looked at me.
“What?”
“She said hello.”
“I knew that.”
“No, you didn’t.”
He ignored me.
“Hi.”
Mimi studied him.
“You are friend of Rosalie?”
Nolan nodded.
“Yes.”
“You live where?”
He pointed vaguely down the street.
“Over there.”
Mimi’s mouth flattened.
“Over there is half of Lakewood.”
I climbed into the car.
“Just tell her.”
Nolan gave his address.
Mimi’s expression changed.
Only a little.
I noticed.
I didn’t understand it yet.
“You call your papa?” Mimi asked.
Nolan shoved his hands into his jacket pockets.
“He doesn’t care.”
Mimi looked at him for maybe two seconds.
Then she unlocked the doors.
“You come.”
I twisted around.
“Mimi.”
“What?”
“You told me yesterday I couldn’t have anyone over.”
“Yesterday your bedroom look like thieves come in and become disappointed.”
“It wasn’t that bad.”
Mimi looked at Nolan.
“It was terrible.”
Nolan laughed.
Traitor.
At Mimi and Baba’s, Nolan ate two grilled-cheese sandwiches and a bowl of tomato soup.
Mimi watched him from the stove.
“You want another?”
“No, ma’am.”
Her eyebrows shot up.
“Do not ma’am me.”
Nolan froze.
I covered my mouth.
Mimi pointed a wooden spoon at him.
“I am Mimi.”
“That’s what Rosalie calls you.”
“Yes.”
“So I call you Mimi?”
“Yes.”
He nodded carefully.
“Okay.”
Mimi turned back to the stove.
I leaned toward him.
“Congratulations. You survived.”
“Barely.”
Baba came in through the mudroom wiping his hands on a shop rag.
His glasses sat low on his nose.
A tiny screwdriver stuck from his shirt pocket.
I pointed.
“Nolan, that’s Baba.”
Baba held out his hand.
Nolan shook it.
Then his eyes went straight to the rag.
“What are you fixing?”
Baba looked at me.
Then Nolan.
“A Hamilton.”
“What happened to it?”
“Stopped.”
“Why?”
Baba’s mouth moved under his mustache.
“If I knew already, I wouldn’t need the bench.”
That was it.
Nolan followed him outside.
I found them twenty minutes later in the workshop.
Baba had the back of the watch open beneath his lamp.
Nolan leaned so close his nose almost touched the magnifying lens.
“Don’t breathe on it,” Baba said.
“I’m not.”
“You are. Humans generally do.”
Nolan sat back.
Baba pointed with tweezers.
“See that?”
I saw nothing useful.
Nolan nodded.
“The gear?”
“Escape wheel.”
“What does it do?”
Baba shifted the lamp.
“Controls release of energy through the movement.”
Nolan stared at it.
I leaned against the doorway.
“You coming inside?”
“In a minute.”
“You said that fifteen minutes ago.”
He didn’t look up.
Baba did.
“You have lost him.”
“I noticed.”
Nolan left that evening carrying a paper bag of food Mimi packed for him.
He tried refusing it twice.
That was adorable.
Nobody refused food from Mimi.
Not successfully.
At the door, Nolan looked toward the workshop.
Then toward the kitchen.
Then at me.
“You here tomorrow?”
“I’m always here.”
He nodded.
“Okay.”
“Why?”
“No reason.”
He came back the next day.
Then again.
Then often enough that nobody bothered asking anymore.
His coat got a hook in the mudroom.
His favorite cereal appeared in Mimi’s pantry.
Baba kept an extra pair of safety glasses on the workbench because Nolan always forgot his.
There wasn’t a meeting.
Nobody announced anything.
He just became part of the house.
And I had no idea how much that was going to matter.
Rosalie came back to the present with the dinner plate still in her hand.
The faucet was running.
She shut it off.
For a few seconds she stood there staring at the sink.
Nolan had entered her life so quietly she couldn’t point to the exact moment he had become necessary.
She only knew that by the time she noticed, he already was.