“Never mind. Go to bed.”

I couldn’t fall asleep after the klezmer night, so I wrote in the notebook instead.

I’m sorry I didn’t return our notebook to you. It was such a simple task, I mean. Yet I botched it. Why I’m writing to you now even though I have no idea how to return this to you, I don’t know. There’s just something about you—and this notebook—that gives me faith.

Were you even at the club tonight? At rst I thought you might have been one of those gumshoe boys, but I quickly realized that was impossible. For one thing, those boys seemed too upbeat. It’s not that I imagine you to be a miserable person, by the way. But I don’t see you as the grinning type, either. Also, I feel like I would have known, like a sensory perception, if you had been standing there near me. For another thing, even though I don’t know how to picture you yet (every time I try, you seem to be holding up a red Moleskine notebook to cover your face), I have a solid feeling you don’t have hair ringlets dangling from your temples. Just a hunch. (But if you do, could I braid them sometime?)

So I left you with a boot and no notebook. Or, rather, I left it with two complete strangers.

You don’t feel like a stranger to me.

I’ll be wearing the spare boot at all times, just in case you happen to be looking for me.

Cinderel a was such a dork. She left behind her glass slipper at the ball and then went right back to her stepmonster’s house. It seems to me she should have worn the glass slipper always, to make herself easier to nd. I always hoped that after the prince found Cinderel a and they rode away in their magni cent carriage, after a few miles she turned to him and said, “Could you drop me o down the road, please?

Now that I’ve nally escaped my life of horri c abuse, I’d like to see something of the world, you know? Maybe backpack across Europe or Asia? I’ll catch back up with you later, Prince, once I’ve found my own way. Thanks for nding me, though! Super-sweet of you. And you can keep the slippers. They’ll probably cause bunions if I keep wearing ’em.” I might have liked to share a dance with you. If I may be so bold to say.

Neither rain, nor sleet, nor gloom of the day after Christmas could keep Grandpa from meeting his buddies for co ee the following afternoon.

I went along, feeling like Grandpa needed the moral support.

While Grandpa was in Florida, where he usually spends the winters, he had indeed proposed on Christmas Day to Mabel, who lives in his complex down there. I have never liked Mabel. Aside from her always telling me and my brother to call her Glamma, her list of step grandmother-to-be infractions is long. Here’s just a sampling: (1) The candies in the bowl in her living room are always stale. (2) She tries to put lipstick or rouge on me even though I don’t like makeup. (3) She’s a terrible cook. (4) Her vegetarian lasagna, which she made sure to mention a million times she made because I’m such a pain that I won’t eat meat, tastes like glue with grated zucchini. (5) She kind of makes me want to barf. (6) So does her lasagna. (7) And the candies in her living room.

Shockingly, Mabel turned down Grandpa’s proposal! I thought my Christmas morning had been sucky—but Grandpa’s had been way worse. When Grandpa presented her with a ring, Mabel told Grandpa she likes the single life and likes having Grandpa as her winter fell a, but she’s got other fell as during the rest of the year, just like he has other gals during the non-winter months! She told him to get his money back for the ring and use it to take her on a swell vacation somewhere grand.

Grandpa never imagined she would turn down his proposal, so rather than consider the logic of Mabel’s answer, he typically returned home to New York a few hours later, totally heartbroken! Especially when he came home to nd his sweet lit le Lily bear was out having a wild night on the town. Like, in twenty-four hours, his whole world turned upside down.

It’s good for the old fell a, I think.

However, Grandpa seems, like, genuinely depressed. So that afternoon, I stayed close to Grandpa’s side as he met with his buddies, all of them retired business owners from around the neighborhood who’ve been meeting regularly for co ee since my mom was a baby, so they could weigh in with their opinions about Grandpa’s Christmas misadventure. Most of his buddies’ names are complicated and involve many syllables, so Langston and I have always referred to them by the names of their former businesses.

The roundtable discussion of Mabel proceeded like this:

Mr. Cannoli told Grandpa, “Arthur, give her time. She’ll come around.”

Mr. Dumpling said, “You virile man, Arthur! This lady not have you, someone bet er will!” Mr. Borscht sighed, “This woman who turns down a marriage proposal on a day that’s sacred to you gentile people is worthy of your heart, Arthur? I think not.”

Mr. Curry exclaimed, “I will find you another lady, my friend!”

“He has plenty of other lady friends here in New York,” I reminded the group. “He just”—this killed me to say, I want to note—“seems to want Mabel for keeps.”

Amazingly, I did not choke on my Lilyccino (foamed milk with shaved chocolate on top, courtesy of Mr. Cannoli’s son-in-law, who now runs Mr. Cannoli’s bakery) when I said this. Grandpa’s face—always so chipper and eager—looked so uncharacteristically downcast. I couldn’t stand it.

“This one!” Grandpa said to his buddies, pointing at me sit ing next to him. “Do you know what she did? Went to a party last night! Stayed out past her curfew! As if my Christmas hadn’t been lousy enough, I come home and panic because Lily bear’s nowhere to be found. She strolls in a few minutes later—at four in the morning!—seemingly without a care in the world.”