Chapter 6: The Vigil

"You're not going," I said.

"I'm going."

"You have a bandage on your head the size of a loaf of bread."

"Then I'll wear a hat."

It was Sunday afternoon and we were arguing in the kitchen, the third argument that day.

John had a Blazers cap of Oz's pulled low over his stitches and a pair of drugstore glasses on his nose.

He looked like a man who'd lost a bet.

"She wants to find me," he said. "I want to see her face when she doesn't."

"And if your memory comes back in the middle of a crowd?"

"Then you'll be next to me."

He said it plainly, as a fact, and I had no answer.

Oz stayed home with three laptops and a promise to watch every traffic camera from the Meridian block.

At 5:50 p.m. John and I stood at the back of a crowd of about three hundred people.

We were outside a tall glass building on Third Avenue.

The sun was low and orange on the glass.

Hundreds of small candles flickered in paper cups.

On a platform at the top of the steps a banner hung, with John's photo on it, the smiling headshot.

Under it were the words: COME HOME, JONAS.

"I look happy," John murmured.

"You look like a toothpaste ad."

"That's the most hurtful thing anyone's said to me today."

"It's only ten to six."

His mouth twitched.

I pulled my hood down and watched the platform.

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