Chapter One


The morning is not quiet. There is no extra rest. The construction on my street begins, like it has every other workday morning this spring, at seven a.m., but even that is preceded by an hour of the workers drinking their coffee and talking so loudly that they may as well be in here with me four floors up. Today they seem to be discussing one of their coworkers.

Carlos almost got in big trouble last night, they're saying.

Carlos nearly got into a fight with some soldiers at that bar.

Did you hear about Carlos?

I pull a robe over my shoulders, and, in the apartment above me, I can hear Patrick moving around. The construction noises have him awake too. I listen to him up there, doing this, doing that. Footsteps. There's the sound of him turning on his shower, the rush of the pipes and the gurgle of the drain rumbling through the mysterious space between my ceiling and his floor. I go to my own bathroom, start my own shower, and get in. With the water running, I can't hear the jackhammer on the street.


Patrick comes down, as he has almost every day before work for the past two and a half weeks. He enters without knocking, while I'm making toast, with a pair of bowl-sized mugs filled with brownish foam. Since I knew he'd be coming, I'm toasting two slices of bread.

"I think I got it, Jess," he says, handing me one of the giant mugs. "Finally. I really think I got the milk-frothing thing. Got it down. Try. Try it."

I take a sip, and it isn't so bad. "This is . . . a cappuccino?"

He seems a little disappointed that I'm not sure what it is. Patrick had a restaurant-grade espresso-making device installed in his kit...