9

While the rest of us were still gawking after Skater Girl, Peter sprang to his feet and sprinted in the direction from which she’d come, bounding up the stone steps as if he hadn’t already done more of a workout today than most people did over the course of any given month. He paused at the top, scanning first one side of the square and then the other, but after a minute he shrugged and rejoined us at the table.

“I thought the guy who paid her might have been watching to make sure she gave it to the right person,” he explained. “But I didn’t see anyone. At least, not anyone familiar or anyone who seemed to be taking any notice of us.” It was a good thought, and I appreciated how quickly he’d both had it and acted on it even if it hadn’t yielded any insight.

There would be plenty of time later to comment on the death wish a person must have to make a habit out of skate-boarding in a city like San Francisco, with its steep downhills, impossible uphills and pedestrian and vehicular traffic, much less debate whether or not skateboarding was hopelessly passé. Instead, we turned our attention to the package Skater Girl had left behind. It was the sort of generic, padded brown-paper envelope that could be found in any drugstore, about the same size as a paperback book. My name was printed on the front in black felt-tip pen-large block letters in a hand none of us recognized.

“Open it,” urged Luisa.

“What if it’s a bomb?” I said

“Don’t be absurd. Why would it be a bomb?” she asked.

“Why would somebody drop a padded envelope in my lap in the middle of Union Square?” I countered.

“I don’t think it’s a bomb,” said Ben.

“Me, neither,” Peter agreed. “Especially not given the way she chucked it onto the table.”

I gingerly held the package up to one ear. It wasn’t very heavy, and I couldn’t hear anything ticking, but I was fairly certain bomb science had advanced beyond the point where an alarm clock was required to detonate an explosive. I’d learned the hard way that airport security believed a simple lip gloss could take down a plane.

Luisa heaved a sigh of impatience, grabbed the envelope from my hand, ripped it open, and dumped the contents on the table. “See,” she said, when we weren’t all blown to bits. “It’s not a bomb. Although,” she said, checking inside the envelope to make sure she hadn’t missed anything, “a bomb might have made more sense.”

We all looked at the item that had fallen out of the envelope. It was a model of the Lincoln Memorial, roughly two inches long and an inch high, molded out of plastic and with a handy ring attached to the top so it could be used as a keychain. A tiny Abraham Lincoln looked out from behind the front colonnade, his expression grave.

“This just might be the most random thing that has ever happened to me,” I said.

“Even more random than what happened over spring break our senior year?” asked Luisa.

“I thought we’d agreed not to discuss that,” I said.

“No,” said Luisa. “You agreed not to discuss that. The rest of us have been saving it for the right moment.” Peter and Ben looked from Luisa to me, clearly wondering what long-ago impropriety could trump this anonymous gift on the randomness scale.

“Well, now isn’t the right moment,” I said, making a mental note to forbid toasts of any sort at my wedding. That spring break was just one of several things Peter would be better off not knowing anything about. “We should be focusing on the keychain.”

Luisa looked bemused, but at least she didn’t giggle.

We took turns examining the model, passing it around the table. Peter was last, and I watched as he turned it over in his hands. “Is it secretly a gadget of some sort?” I asked hopefully. The molded plastic didn’t weigh more than a few ounces, but perhaps the top opened up into another memory stick somehow.

But he shook his head. “I don’t think so. What we see seems to be what we’ve got. Does the Lincoln Memorial have any special meaning for you?”

“Not that I’m aware of,” I said.

“Why don’t we all free-associate?” suggested Luisa. “Just say the first thing that comes to mind when we think of the Lincoln Memorial.”

It was a strange idea, but nobody had any better ones, so we agreed it was worth a try.

“‘Four score and seven years ago,’” said Peter, who’d done a double major in history and engineering.

“Ford’s Theatre and John Wilkes Booth,” said Ben, the federal agent.

“President’s Day weekend, white sales and hot tubs,” said Luisa. She was trained as a corporate lawyer, but shopping and skiing, particularly the après-ski lounging part of skiing, were two of her favorite pastimes, and she’d always appreciated Washington and Lincoln for the role they played in making these activities possible.

“The penny. And the five-dollar bill,” I said. I did work in finance, after all. “Oh, and mustard.”

They stared at me. “Mustard?” asked Luisa.

“We went to Washington, D.C., on a school trip when I was in high school. I bought a soft pretzel from one of the snack carts just before we went to see the Lincoln Memorial, and by accident I got mustard on my shirt,” I explained. “But then it made it easy for me to remember that Daniel Chester French was the sculptor who did the Lincoln statue. Because of French’s Mustard. Which was good, because that was a question on the pop quiz our teacher gave us on the bus ride home.” They continued to stare at me. “We are free-associating, right?”

“I hadn’t realized just how dependent you were on Diet Coke to think clearly,” said Luisa, lighting yet another cigarette.

This was more of a simple observation than anything else, and there was more than a grain of truth in it, but in my delicate state I found it hard not to be provoked by her words, especially given the direction in which her own free associating had led her. “Listen, Little Miss Hot Tub, I’ve now gone-” I checked my watch “-eight full hours without caffeine. I may be a little bit grumpy, but I think I’m holding up well, all things considered.”

“Of course you are, Rachel,” she said, her tone soothing, as if she were speaking to a small child. “And we’re very proud of you.”

Maybe if I hadn’t been in withdrawal, I wouldn’t have taken offense. As it was, I took her tone as the verbal equivalent of throwing down the gauntlet. “I’d like to see how you’d do without cigarettes for eight full hours.”

“I’d do fine, thank you,” she said.

“Then I dare you,” I said.

“Dare me what?” she inquired, simultaneously arching one eyebrow and breathing out smoke.

“No cigarettes for eight hours.” Then I had an even better idea. “No-wait-how about no cigarettes until ten on Tuesday morning?”

“Tuesday?” she said. “Why Tuesday?”

“That’s when my dare runs out. It’s only forty hours away.”

“You’re really daring me?” she asked, a note of trepidation creeping into her voice.

“You can turn it down, of course. I mean, that would be the wussy thing to do, but you have the option.”

She glared at me. “I’m not a wuss.”

“Prove it,” I said.

“Why should I have to?”

“Why should I have to?”

“This is a very unattractive side of you, Rachel.”

I couldn’t disagree. Withdrawal was definitely not bringing out the “attractive” in me. But I’d backed her into a corner and she knew there was only one way to escape with her dignity intact. “Do you accept the dare?”

“Fine,” she said eventually, but she didn’t sound like she thought it was.

“Good,” I said. “So no more cigarettes until Tuesday morning at ten. Starting now.” I held out the cup with the remains of my seltzer.

She glared at me some more, but then she closed her eyes, took a final deep drag and exhaled a final stream of smoke. Wistfully, she dropped the half-smoked cigarette into the cup. There was a soft sizzle as it hit the liquid and went out.