he green dress I’d saved for was still in Claire’s bedroom when my phone slipped beneath her couch. I reached into the gap and pulled out something with my own eight-year-old face on it. Then I saw a note in Claire’s handwriting dated the day we matched on Tinder, and realized she’d known me first.
My phone disappeared between Claire’s couch cushion and the armrest while she was in the bedroom changing into the green dress I’d bought her.
I muttered something I wouldn’t repeat in front of my mother and shoved my hand into the gap.
She was in the bedroom changing into the green dress.
My fingers found two quarters, a pen cap, something that felt suspiciously like an ancient potato chip, and finally my phone.
But when I pulled my hand out, a photograph came with it.
It landed facedown on the rug.automatically.
Then I stopped.
A photograph came with it.
The picture was old enough that the colors had faded around the edges. A group of children sat on the floor of what looked like a library, each holding a book.
The picture was old.
Near the end of the row was a skinny boy with uneven brown hair and a gap where one front tooth should have been.
Me.
Eight years old, maybe nine.
I knew it was me because I remembered that awful striped shirt. My mother had insisted it made me look “handsome.”
I remembered that awful striped shirt.
I had never given Claire a childhood photograph.
Standing beside me was a girl about my age wearing purple glasses.
I turned the photograph over.
In faded blue ink, someone had written:
“Nora + Ethan, Summer Reading Club.”
I had never given Claire a childhood photograph.
Below that, in muchnewer black ink, were five words.
“Found Ethan today. Tell him.”
Underneath was a date.
I checked it twice.
It was the date Claire and I had matched on Tinder.
Underneath was a date.
***
Cold prickled across my arms even though Claire’s apartment was warm.
“Ethan?”
Her voice came from the bedroom.
I stared at the handwriting.
A second later, Claire stepped into the living room.
I stared at the handwriting.
The dress fit her perfectly.
Emerald green, exactly the way I’d pictured it when I went back to the boutique without her. Her dark hair was pinned loosely behind one ear, and she was still fastening the other earring.
For a moment, she smiled.
The dress fit her perfectly.
Then she saw the photograph.
Her fingers stayed on the earring.
She didn’t finish putting it in.
“Where did you get that?”
I almost laughed.
“Your couch.”
Claire said nothing.She saw the photograph.
I held the photograph up.
“Who is Nora?”
Her hand dropped slowly.
“Ethan…”
“No.” I pointed to the date. “Why did you write this the day we met?”
She looked toward the couch as though there might be another answer sitting there.
“Who is Nora?”
Finally she said, “Because I knew who you were.”
I stared at her.
“Before Tinder?”
“Yes.”
The green dress suddenly looked absurdly bright in the room.
“You knew me before we matched?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“Because I knew who you were.”
Claire looked at the photograph instead of answering.
I read the note aloud.
“‘Found Ethan today. Tell him.’ Tell me what?”
She reached for the back of a dining chair but didn’t sit.
“Nora was my sister.”
I read the note aloud.
I looked at the little girl in the photograph again.
Something moved at the edge of my memory.
Purpleglasses.
A laugh.
A book held open between two sets of knees.
Nothing stayed long enough to grab.
“Your sister?”
Something moved at the edge of my memory.
“My half-sister. She was much younger than me.”
“Why am I in a picture with her?”
Claire looked directly at me now.
“Because you were friends.”
The answer should have helped.
Instead, it made everything worse.
“Why am I in a picture with her?”
***
I had spent six months believing I knew exactly how Claire and I began.
I was 25 and nearly done with dating apps.
Claire was 45. She had been different from her very first message. She was direct, funny, and certain about what she wanted.
I was 25 and nearly done with dating apps.
The 20-year age difference made me hesitate, but only briefly.
Our first coffee lasted almost four hours.
She remembered that I hated cinnamonin coffee.
I remembered that she collected terrible refrigerator magnets whenever she traveled.
The 20-year age difference made me hesitate.
By our third date, she knew the name of my boss, my favorite pizza place, and the story behind the scar on my wrist.
With Claire, I had never had to guess what she meant.
Apparently I’d only been guessing where she’d come from.
I had never had to guess what she meant.
***
“So you matched with me because of Nora.”
Claire didn’t dodge it.
“At first, yes.”
I set the photograph on the coffee table.
“Wow.”
“Ethan, I wasn’t trying to trick you into a relationship.”
“You literally recognized me from childhood and didn’t tell me.”
“I know.”
“I wasn’t trying to trick you into a relationship.”
“You went to coffee already knowing who I was.”
“Yes.”
“And I knew nothing.”
She closed her eyes for a second.
“Yes.I meant to tell you that day.”
I picked up the photograph and tapped the newer handwriting.
“You wrote this before you saw me again.”
“I meant to tell you that day.”
I looked at the date on the photograph again.
“Were you ever going to tell me? Where was this taken?”
“The old Pine Street library.”
I frowned.
“Didn’t they gut that place years ago?”
“The original children’s room is still there,” she said. “They rebuilt around it.”
“Didn’t they gut that place years ago?”
Then I could see pieces of it.
Low shelves.
Beanbags.
A paper sun hanging crookedly from a ceiling tile.
I could almost smell the dusty carpet.
Then something else.
Yellow.
I could see pieces of it.
I stared at the picture.
“Her glasses were yellow.”
Claire blinked.
“What?”
“Nora’s glasses. They were yellow.”
Claire looked at the photograph again.
“They were purple.”
