Page 41 of Smoke and Roses

Bruno sniffs my boots. He sniffs my knees. Then he sits down and looks up at me with his tail wagging.

“Guess he likes me.”

Nate turns his head a little when he talks, with his right ear toward me. Deaf on the left, then. “Huh.”

Caleb comes out of his office with a clipboard. “Folsom, Novak. Welcome to Eden. Board gave me two more slots after the summer we had, so don’t make me regret asking. Raines, Mathews, you two have been here a month, so you’re the old guys now. Take them to Rocco’s and feed them. Then bring them back so I can scare them.”

I’ll take a lunch mission.

The four of us end up in the corner booth at Rocco’s at 1100, with Bruno under the table on Nate’s boots and his chin on mine.

It doesn’t take long to figure out how it’s going to be. Novak talks. Devin talks. Nate says about six words. I say about four. Somewhere in the second pot of coffee, Novak starts handing out nicknames.

“Mathews is Fish. Because Coast Guard. Folsom is Doc.”

“That doesn’t make sense,” Nate says.

“Nothing about me makes sense, Doc.” Novak points his fork at me. “And you’re Romeo.”

Devin chokes on his coffee.

“No,” I say.

“Oh, yes. You moved here a month ago and you’re already sleeping with the florist. Rob told me. Rob and I have known each other since the airport parking lot at seven this morning.”

“I’m not…”

“Then explain to me,” Novak says, leaning across the table, “why the florist just walked by the window, waved at you, and you smiled.”

Lindsey is on the sidewalk across the street with a bucket of mums in her arms and her hair up.

I did smile. I didn’t know I did.

“Romeo,” Novak says, with enormous satisfaction, and even Bruno thumps his tail.

Two minutes later the bell over Rocco’s door jingles, and Lindsey comes in with four sunflowers wrapped in brown paper.

“Welcome to Eden,” she says, and hands one to each of them. “It’s a tradition. Every new firefighter gets a sunflower from the shop. My grandma started it in 1975.”

Novak takes his like it’s a medal. Devin tucks his behind his ear. Nate holds his like somebody handed him a live grenade, and Bruno comes out from under the table and leans on Lindsey’s knees.

“Oh, hello, handsome,” she says, and rubs his ears. Bruno closes his eyes and groans.

“He doesn’t like people,” Nate says, sounding betrayed.

“Dogs like me. It’s the flowers.” She holds out her hand to him. “Lindsey North.”

As they shake hands, Nate’s eyes go to her wrist, where the cuff of her sweater has slid back. There’s a tiny tattoo there, a dandelion gone to seed, with three little seeds blowing away.

“Nice work,” he says. “Fine lines. Who did it?”

“A woman with a shop on 25th Street in Ogden.” Lindsey touches the dandelion.

Nate looks at it a second longer before he looks away.

Lindsey kisses me on the cheek, right there in Rocco’s in front of all of them, and goes back out with the bell ringing behind her.

There’s a short silence in the booth. Then Novak ruins it. “Romeo,” he says.