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“Thank you.” He took the quesadilla triangle from me, our hands brushing again, sending another thrill all the way through me. “So where do you fall with the whole Ship of Theseus thing?”
Theseus’s Sailboat was a reference to the thought puzzle of the Ship of Theseus—which I hadn’t ever heard of before I read the book (and I had a theory that the book would have done better if it had a different title). The puzzle describes a ship that’s been rebuilt over the years, plank by plank, until none of the first ship remains. And the question was if that ship could still be considered the Ship of Theseus even though none of the original components were there.
“You mean do I think it’s still the same ship? Even though every part of it has changed?” Russell nodded. I’d never had to think about it before—but then again, I’d never had anyone to talk about my favorite book with before. “I think so,” I said slowly. “I mean, the essence still remains, right? It’s more than the sum of its parts.”
“I think so too. It’s just like us, actually—”
“Wait.” I held up my hands. “I think I sense a fun fact coming. A football field fun fact!”
“Darcy.”
“Friday Night Facts! Sunday Night Factball? I’m done now.”
“Are you?”
“Probably not. But I do want to know the fact.”
“Well—it was just that we’re like the ship too. Our whole systems change over every seven years. So you’re physically not the same person you were when you were a kid. But you’re still you, right?”
I nodded, turning this over in my mind.
“It’s actually why—” He stopped short and shook his head. “Sorry, that was about to be an un-fun fact.”
“Well, now I have to hear it.”
“You sure?”
“Positive.”
“So.” Russell cleared his throat. “It’s, um, where the phrase the seven-year itch comes from. Because back in the day, when you had scabies—”
“Scabies?” I paused, a bite of quesadilla halfway to my mouth.
“Yeah, they’re um, skin mites? And before people had antibiotics, they would have them for seven years.”
I looked down at my quesadilla—I no longer had much of an appetite. I put it back on the plate and pushed it a little ways away from me.
“See? I told you it was un-fun. Not romantic at all.” As soon as he said this, his eyes widened, like he’d just realized what he’d done.
I smiled down at the AstroTurf. Now that he’d said it out loud, it was just confirmation that we were on the same page—that maybe he liked me as much as I liked him.
You don’t actually know him, the Didi in my head piped up.
She’s getting to know him, Katy admonished her. Leave Darce alone.
A breeze blew across the football field, not as warm as the one in the parking lot had been. It was definitely starting to get colder, and I reached for my canvas bag. I dug out my Nighthawks sweatshirt and pulled it on.
“Oh,” Russell said as he looked at my sweatshirt, eyebrows raised.
I looked down at it and laughed. I was used to it now, the image of Wylie Sanders, leather jacket open over his bare chest, staring soulfully at the camera. I would sometimes get double-takes when I wore it out and about, but I didn’t care. It almost became like a shibboleth—people I didn’t even know would nod at me, and random strangers would smile and give me a thumbs-up. Like a secret code among Nighthawks fans. “I know. It was my dad’s. It’s a lot, but fun, right?”
“I guess you’re a big fan?” Russell was still blinking at Wylie staring out at him.
“I mean, my dad is.”
“He did name you after one of their songs.”
“This is the truth. I suppose a casual fan wouldn’t have done that.”
