“Rooster?” Kelsey asked.

“Sam, if you don’t mind, ma’am,” he said, revealing freckles as he got closer.

“No, he likes Rooster better, trust me,” said his companion, a lanky, bespectacled guy with caramel-colored skin.

“I do not,” Sam said matter-of-factly.

The other guy rolled his eyes. “I’m Phil.”

“Hello, Phil,” Kelsey said, shaking hands all around.

She took a deep breath as they descended into the metro, and remembered what her parents had told her before she left for the airport, pleased that she was trying to move forward from her grief. Just try to have fun, they had said. They may have been mistaken about where she would be having fun, but Kelsey took it to heart, anyway. She had to.

She gave her biggest Midwestern smile to the severe-looking women in high heels and the old ladies with dark lipstick and the men with sculpted, curly hair who stared at the four Americans as they rode through the underbelly of the city.

She soaked in the yellowed brick and gilded block letters of each platform, just like in the movies, trying to identify the artwork on the rows of posters.

Even the advertisements are beautiful, she found herself telling Michelle in her mind.

That one is Edgar Degas, she thought, looking at the rough sketch of a woman stepping out of a tub on an ad for a museum called Musée d’Orsay. Next to it, women from a hundred years ago, lifting their dark skirts to reveal petticoats and calves. Next to that, the iconic tulle brushstrokes, her favorite of his before she even knew who he was: The Pink Dancers, Before the Ballet.

Peter leaned close to Kelsey, pointing at their stop on a map, and she could feel her skin getting hot under her sweater, from all the excitement, from the pressure of what she had to tell him, or maybe just from having him around, a pair of arms and eyes and boots to go with the face she had grown to know.

They emerged onto the Place de Clichy, at the edge of what Kelsey could only call a roundabout. Motorcycles, old-fashioned taxis, and tiny cars wound around a cement circle to their various branching roads and, in the center of it, a giant copper sculpture.

Even the traffic is influenced by art, she took note for her sister.

Their hotel was nearby.

Soon, everything might fall apart, and Kelsey dreaded it. Especially here. It shouldn’t happen here, where it was midday, the sun at the highest point in the sky, bouncing off red awnings and wet stones and linen on tables, beneath the twisting streetlamps, and windows that opened onto narrow streets lined by balconies.…

“Coming?” Peter called to her from ahead, holding out his hand.

She nodded and followed the group down one avenue, then another, then back the other way for a wrong turn, and finally to a building marked only by the number painted above the doorway.

“Okay,” Peter said, glancing at the directions he had printed out. “40 Rue Nollet.”

He rang the bell.

Inside, they found a steep wooden staircase and a wizened caretaker, whose tiny frame disappeared into her apron.

“C’est ici,” she said after four flights, pointing to a thick white wooden door.

She led them inside to find two large beds, and a window from ceiling to floor, opening to a small iron balcony.

“Merci. Enjoy,” she said, and exited.

Phil and Sam tossed their canvas bags onto one bed and stretched, taking in the view of the city.

“One room?” Kelsey said, turning to Peter.

“Nice and cozy,” Peter said, winking. Then he whispered, “Sorry. This city ain’t cheap.”

“That’s okay,” she replied.

As she watched Peter peel off his army T-shirt to don civilian clothes, she was also grateful that she wouldn’t have to talk her way out of doing whatever it was that Michelle and Peter would do in a bed alone.

She was blushing. Again.

The close quarters would make it difficult to have any private conversation, though, let alone the one they were meant to have. But deep down, Kelsey was grateful to put it off.

Soon, the four of them set out on the metro to find a shop called Shakespeare and Company, at Peter’s request.

Sam took some convincing as they hung on to a metal bar for balance, huddled among the passengers. “I’m not shelling out euros to see Shakespeare, no way. Can’t understand that crap. Never could. Might as well pay to watch a soap opera in Spanish.”

Peter laughed, his hand on Kelsey’s back. “It’s a bookstore, Rooster. Where all the American writers used to hang out in the 1920s. Hemingway’s favorite.”

The street they searched for, it turned out, was right across the river from Notre Dame Cathedral. When she saw it, she drew in a breath. The cathedral was gigantic, of course, but the late-afternoon light made the small shadows just as important as the enormous towers, emphasizing the structure’s tiny curves and faces and leaves. Never before had Kelsey seen a building that asked so much of those who looked at it. Every inch had been carved into something else.

Inside the bookstore, Kelsey found a quiet, hidden corner to collect her thoughts. The wet-wood smell of old books arose from all sides. She knew nothing of the history of this place, but she could feel it in the silence. She was a stranger to everyone except herself, and now that she was alone, she found she didn’t care. The boys were just as in awe. The beauty of Paris had made words unnecessary.

Between the shelves, she spotted Peter, absorbed in a large book with bright images.

“Peter,” she said quietly.

He looked up, and searched for the sound of her voice. When he saw her, he smiled. “Look what I found,” he said.

As she approached, she noticed a leaf bud from one of the trees had gotten caught in Peter’s hair. When she removed it, for some reason, she couldn’t bear to toss the leaf on the floor. She pocketed it.

“Your book on Andy Warhol, the one you have in your room,” he said, pointing at an image of the artist in black and white. “But in French.”

Michelle’s book. Kelsey had paged through it a few times, when Ian had told her to look him up, and when she was composing her first letter to Peter.

“Tell me what it says,” he said, his mouth lifting at the corners hopefully, his eyes washing over her.

Kelsey’s mouth went dry, and she looked at the pages full of random syllables, which might as well have been completely blank.

“It says…” she said, letting out nervous laughter. Her game was up. The words came out of her, clumsy. “It gives his birth date and says he was a great artist, that his work is not snobby or hard to understand.”

“Is that really what it says?” he asked, his eyes narrowing, playful.

Kelsey’s hands were in fists in the pockets of her jacket. She met his eyes. Maybe now was the time. She swallowed, trying not to let her voice shake. “No,” she said. “I’m bullshitting you.”

Peter closed the book, and replaced it on the shelf. “I’m sure it’s close enough,” he replied. He took her in his arms, her cheek to his chest, and she could feel his voice come through his body and into hers. “Right now, you could tell me the sky was green and I’d believe you.”

Kelsey slipped out of his embrace, pretending to browse, trying to resist the look on his face, the look that said he wanted to kiss her again. “But the sky’s not green. And that’s not what the book says. That’s not the truth.”

From behind her, Peter said quietly, “I like anything that comes from you. That’s truth enough for me.”

Kelsey hid a smile, but she wasn’t sure who she was hiding it from anymore. She let him take her hand and lead her through the shelves, where Sam and Phil waited for them outside.

They took the train home.

After catching the sandwich shop down the street from their hotel before it closed, they had a dinner of ham and cheese on baguette near the square, in a jet-lagged haze, watching the passersby.