I lifted it with both hands the wayshehad taught me, the way I had taught myself. I turned it. Saw the label.
John Coltrane.A Love Supreme.Supersense Archival Tape Edition. Austria, 2021. Number 47 of 500, pressed directly from the original master tapes.
“This should not be here,” I said.
“No,” he said. “It should not.”
“This is—” I stopped. I knew what this cost. I knew within a range narrow enough to make my stomach turn. “Mr. Ellis, this is not in my budget.”
“I know,” he said. “That’s why it’s not for sale.”
I looked up.
“Go ahead,” he said. “The tissue paper.”
I set the acetate carefully back in its nest. Lifted the first layer of archival tissue. Underneath it, on a small card in handwriting I had been reading for years, were eleven words.
I found something that tops Minnie. Say yes. - D
I stood at the corner table in the back of the drill hall at WaxCon and read those words on a small card and felt the floor do something it was not supposed to do. I put one gloved hand on the edge of the table.
Mr. Ellis said nothing. He had the grace of a man who had seen a lot of things and knew when to be quiet.
I turned around.
Deion was no longer elsewhere. He was now standing about six feet behind me, not making anything of it, not down on one knee, not making a production. Just standing there in the middle of WaxCon on a Saturday morning with his hands in his pockets and the expressionthat meant he was not going anywhere and was not going to need me to explain.
In one hand he was holding a small box.
“You talked to Coltrane Man,” I said.
“Mr. Ellis,” he said. “His name is Mr. Ellis.”
“You told him about the tingle.”
“He already knew about the tingle. I just confirmed it.”
I looked at him. The box in his hand. The card still in mine. The floor still shifting under me since I read it. “You planned this.”
“I did.”
“You havebeenplanning this.”
“For a while,” he said. “You told me once that you remember everything. I’ve been counting on that.”
“You said one day you were going to find something that impresses me,” I said.
“I remember.”
“That was eight years ago.”
“I know how long it was,” he said, quiet.
I took the gloves off. I handed them back to Mr. Ellis without looking at him. I looked at Deion, at the box in his hand, at the patience of a man who had been waiting a decade and was now standing in the middle of a hall in Philadelphia asking to stay.
He opened the box.
“Nova Celeste James,” he said. “You told me once that you remember everything.” He looked at me steadily. “I have been counting on that. But I want you to know that I remember everything too. I also have a drawer.
