Bright Lights, Dark Nights (17 page)

I handed the CD to Naomi. I'd chosen the first Stevie Wonder album I got into,
Talking Book
, in honor of our conversation under his mug. It had two of my favorite Stevie Wonder songs, “Tuesday Heartbreak,” and “I Believe.” If only it'd had “Knocks Me Off My Feet”—I would have put Naomi in a perpetual swoon.

We headed back out as the afternoon was fading. Shadows were flooding the buildings up to the bright tops the sun could still reach. My mom had given me money when I'd visited to take Naomi out, though I didn't tell Naomi that. I gave my mom a hard time over the money concerns and the priority she puts on it, but the truth is it felt good to have money to take Naomi out and spend the day in the city.

“What's next?” Naomi asked.

I didn't have a plan, and Naomi was looking at me expectantly. I could dodge it for a bit, but at some point she was going to realize I was dreadfully boring.

“We can visit my mom again,” I said. At least I had jokes.

“Oh no,” Naomi said, waving her hands. “I think we've had enough of that for one week, or month, or year. I'm kidding, I love your mom.”

“Are you hungry?” I asked.

“Always,” Naomi said. That was good, she'd never figure out how boring I was as long as I could keep her fed.

“We could have a dinner adventure,” I suggested. “Let's get something neither of us has ever had before. Like, I've never had Thai. Korean barbecue. Sushi. Basically anything that isn't McDonald's is going to be an adventure on my end.”

“Let's do sushi!” Naomi said. “That's exciting.”

*   *   *

There was a sushi restaurant farther into the city, Sushi Palace Ai. The palace was down a set of stairs, through a few tight hallways. It was a little claustrophobic and dim, with strung lights hanging along the walls and ceiling and neon signs for color. The restaurant was about half full, and seeing as it wasn't even five yet, we took that as a sign that this was a good place. They sat us at a small table in the middle of the room. We didn't know what to order, so we chose completely at random. Oysters looked gross. The sushi rolls all had bizarre ingredients, fish and fruit and things I didn't know what they were. But I wanted to go really random. I chose the monkfish.

“It's probably all good, right?” I asked. I took my phone out after we'd ordered. “They wouldn't sell it if it was gross. I'm not ignoring you—promise. I'm looking up my dinner.”

Apparently I was about to eat a fish that was large enough to eat lobsters, giving itself a lobsteresque flavor. My dinner was science fiction. “Oh, I'll pay for dinner,” I said. “I actually have money and everything.”

“Are you sure?” Naomi asked. “I can pay for my half. I don't want you to think you have to or anything.”

“I got it,” I said. “I'm going to get you that Positive K CD, too, so you can hear what all the buzz is about.”

“This is going to sound crazy, but I kinda hate sitting in the middle of a restaurant,” Naomi said, hunched in on herself. “This is the crazy part. I feel like I'm being
watched
. I know nobody actually cares what I do, but what if I have to use a fork instead of chopsticks or something, right? And then they'll laugh or get us kicked out or something.”

“If anyone laughs, we'll stab them with our forks,” I said. When the waiter walked by, I asked if we could have a more private table, and he led us to an elevated booth area in the corner of the restaurant. We had a candle and some yellow flowers in our new spot.

“You're so sweet. You actually entertained my neurosis,” Naomi said, sliding into our new booth. “You didn't have to do that.”

“No, I was thinking about it, and you're definitely right. They'd kick us out if they caught us using the forks they provided,” I said. “I can't believe I ordered the Godzilla of the sea. This thing eats
lobsters,
Nay. Can I call you that?”

“Nay.” Naomi shook her head.

“What if it springs back to life and tries to eat me?” I asked.

“I'll stab it with my fork,” Naomi said, clutching her fork like a weapon. People go to restaurants all the time. People my own age go to diners or whatever like it's nothing, but I felt like a kid in a grown-up's suit in this place. Like Naomi and I were playing pretend.

“I read somewhere you have to have water with sushi because it's offensive to the fish if you drink soda,” I said as the waiter brought us two glasses of water.

“That makes sense, since they swim in water,” Naomi said. “But they swim in salt water, so…”

“We'll have to add salt, then,” I lamented. “This dinner is going to be horrible, isn't it?”

“It's so complicated.” Naomi took out her phone. “I'm not ignoring you—promise. Want to see something frightening? You're going to hate me after this.”

Naomi fiddled with her phone and then showed me a series of photos of her baby sister in various outfits Naomi had made for her—baby superhero, baby English gentleman, baby fairy, baby monster. They were actually detailed and well done.

“This is amazing,” I said. “Do you want to be a photographer or designer or something? What do you do with these?”

“This is the first thing I have ever done with them. My mom helps me out with the outfits and gets me materials and stuff. This is what we do in my family. I'm such a weirdo, right? You can leave if you want. I'll pay for dinner. I'm sorry I showed you that.” She put the phone away. “But, no, I don't know what I want to do. Is that crazy? I can play the harp all right, but is that something people do? I need more hobbies. I'm going to be a cat lady or something, making outfits for all my cats.”

“I doubt that,” I said. “But you could probably get really famous if you did.”

Our waiter brought out our dinner, and the monkfish wasn't the best thing I'd ever had. Not terrible, but it was no cheeseburger. Naomi, however, fixed herself a small dish of wasabi and soy sauce and dove into her monster roll.

“Don't like it?” Naomi said, reading my face. “You're eating the Godzilla of the sea. You'd think it would be the most delicious.”

“It's fine,” I said. Naomi pushed her miso soup over to me.

“Try that,” she said. “Okay. Naomi confession: I've had sushi before. Like, a lot. I kind of love sushi. My family gets it every Sunday. I guess I'm not that adventurous.” She slapped her palm to her face.

“You're such a cute little habitual liar,” I said, and finished off her miso soup.

“Tell that to Uncle Dave,” Naomi said, and snuck a piece of monkfish off my plate.

*   *   *

The sun was fully down by the time we were street level again. Naomi rubbed her arms to warm up. Just an hour or two earlier I wasn't sure we'd need coats. I rubbed her back with my hand for a second, sure she'd feel like she was by the fireplace.

“So you still can't tell me about this spot?” I asked. “Are you going to kill me? That's it, isn't it? It's a murder dungeon.”

“Maybe, but I can't tell you yet,” Naomi said. “You'll have to be surprised. It's a surprise murder.”

Naomi took me up the street to a department store where a lady was selling flowers, specifically to young couples. I shrugged.
Lady, I blew all my money on dinner. Leave us alone.
We went inside and browsed casually for a bit, and then Naomi pulled me through a door in the back.

“You have to sneak up. It doesn't work if anyone knows you're here,” Naomi said as we went up a bunch of flights of stairs. “This is where my sister used to work, by the way.”

“You
are
a wild child,” I said, following her up the spirals of stairs and rapidly losing my breath. We finally got to the top and exited a door and emerged on the rooftop.

“So this is where my sis would take me.” Naomi twirled. The city lights reached up from the streets and alleys, but up here, the moonlight fought them off. “It looks like a regular old building roof, right? But it's
not
. It's the highest building in the city. This is my spot. You can't help but dream up here. I'm going to take my baby sis up here when she's older so she can dream, too. You can see the whole world from up here.”