me that Zach wanted to use the workshop over the weekend. Could I come in to unlock it for him and to supervise?
“For a few hours,” I conceded, already resentful of giving up even that much of my Saturday. “In the morning, because I have plans later. Can he be there at eight?”
To my surprise he was. When I arrived he was already sitting on the workshop steps, backpack slung over his shoulders, headphones on his ears. He said nothing when I let him in and got right to work, moving around the shop with a familiarity that made him look like a very young professional. I sat on a stool with my newspaper and coffee, and read.
As he worked, he sang to himself. It seemed almost unconscious, and when I stole a glance at him, I saw him briskly measuring and marking as he sang. Apart from the rest of the madrigal choir, I was struck by the beauty of his individual voice. It had the pure, clear-spring quality of a child in a boys’ choir, partnered with the faintly raspy undertone of a voice only recently changed. It wasn’t the voice of a rock star, even if rock was what he was singing—a sad song, bittersweet and mournful.
“That’s a very depressing song you were singing,” I said when he pulled the headphones down, letting them rest around his neck. He sat down at the adjacent side of the table from me and hoisted up his backpack.
He smiled. “It’s Ben Folds Five. I didn’t realize you were listening.”
“Is that the name of the song, or the band?”
“The band. ‘Brick’ is the name of the song.” He unzipped his backpack and pulled out a notebook, a bottle of green tea and an organic granola bar. Flipping the notebook to a schematic drawing of the playhouse, he examined it while swigging from the tea bottle. He unwrapped the bar and took a bite. It was no wonder he was in such good shape. When Scott was younger I had fed him exclusively out of natural-foods stores, but since adolescence he would only eat like that if the pantry offered him no alternative. Maybe Zach was in the same boat.
I pointed to the initials on the front pocket of his backpack. “What’s the X for?”
He grinned and took a drink of his tea. “I’m not telling you that.”
“Why not?”
He shrugged. “Why should I?”
“It’s probably for Xavier.”
“It’s not Xavier.”
“That’s the only boy’s name that starts with X.”
He bit into the granola bar. With his voice muffled by granola he replied, “No, it’s not.”
“Well, what is it, then?”
I waited until he swallowed for my answer. Then with a sly expression he asked, “If you’re so curious, why don’t you just look it up in my file? You’re a teacher, aren’t you?”
“Because I don’t want to go nosing around in your business.”
“Nose around all you want. I’m an open book.”
I sipped my coffee. “I don’t know any teenager that’s true for.”
“You do now.”
“Come on, just tell me.”
“What’s in it for me?”
I considered the question. In his eyes and at the corners of his smile I could see a hint of the mischievousness that, for him, had always preceded an off-color remark. Before he could crack a joke in that vein I replied, “Coffee.”
“What kind of coffee?”
“Whatever you want. Starbucks.”
He wrinkled his nose in distaste. “Starbucks is corporate.”
“Well, it’s what we’ve got around here. This is the ’burbs, not New Hampshire.”
“Tell me about it,” he said. “What about with a black-and-white cookie? I love their black-and-white cookies.”
“I don’t know about that.” I took a drink of my own corporate latte. “Steiner might not approve.”
He laughed. “Seriously, are you buying me off?”
I nodded. He gauged my seriousness and replied, “It stands for Xiang.”
“That starts with a
“No. In Chinese, the
I gave him an admiring look. “Does it really?”
He nodded. He looked a little proud. “Zachary Xiang Patterson,” I said, carefully pronouncing each crisp word.
“I have the coolest initials on the planet.”
I gazed at the black-markered initials again, a code I could suddenly read. Then I admitted, “I probably wouldn’t have guessed you were part Chinese if I hadn’t met your mother.”
