A startled laugh bursts from me. I decide on the spot to like the Cajun.
“Sorry to tell you, man.” I gesture to the scar above my temple. “But that’s already been done.”
He narrows his eyes in consideration, then tips his hat to us before sauntering down the street. He’s whistling a tune that’s vaguely familiar. When I see the fiddle case in his hand, it comes to me. “When the Saints Go Marching In.” An old Louis Armstrong classic. Luc was teaching Maggie to play it on the guitar in the weeks before we left New Orleans.
“After you.” Luc holds the gate wide and I walk through the short tunnel into the courtyard. The brick pavers are old and rounded at the edges. Some are jacketed in a soft layer of green moss. Others are crumbling or missing altogether. Wrought-iron furniture with bright red cushions is arranged around the space, and a large fountain dripping cool, clear water stands sentinel in the center of it all.
The air is humid and heavy with the smells from the spice shop and… Downy fabric softener. Someone nearby is doing a load of laundry.
Here in the shade of the buildings, the small amount of sunlight remaining outside is lost. But white twinkle lights strung along the railings of the inner galleries cast the whole place in a magical glow.
There’s nowhere on earth quite like the Crescent City. No sound quite like the wind over the jigsaw rooftops of The Quarter. No sight quite like the big paddle wheel on the Steamboat Natchez. No joy quite like the daily revelry in the streets.
Through all the laughing and crying, the birthing and dying, this city…she abides. Like a jewel in the crown of the South, she gleams eternal. And despite the erratic rhythm of my heart and my sweaty palms, I can’t deny it’s good to be back.
“Come up.” Maggie’s voice drifts down to us from above. She’s come out the other side of her apartment to stand on the gallery that runs the length of her unit.
Luc beats me to the stairs and takes the steps two at a time, his boot heels clapping eagerly on the treads. Once he hits the landing, he stops, staring at Maggie the way he’s always stared at her. They’re close enough to touch, and yet the years of silence have created a chasm between them.
Guilt hits me hard.I’mthe one who built that distance.I’mto blame for…everything. But leave it to Maggie to bridge the divide. She takes two steps and throws herself into Luc’s arms.
I glance down at my own boots, too ashamed to see the relief in my best friend’s eyes. But my chin jerks up again when I hear Maggie laugh. It’s a gossamer sound, as light as cotton candy. Luc twirls her around, sending her hair flying in a silky curtain that makes my fingers itch to reach out and touch.
When the green-eyed monster starts up again, I flick the fucker off my shoulder and imagine stomping on its head. No time like the present to setThe Planinto motion.
Making my way up the stairs, I reach the landing as Luc sets Maggie on her feet. She looks at me, her cheeks flushed prettily. “Cash?”
I try to rememberThe Plan, but I can’t remember who I am, where I am,whenI am. With Maggie using those angel eyes on me, with my name fitting inside her mouth like it’s meant to be there, I’m in high school again. A boy on the verge of becoming a man. A neophyte falling in love for the first time.
“Maggie.” Those two syllables are pulled out of me by the force of feelings that will never die.
