Didn’t they know there was a cemetery there before they started digging?

I wonder how they knew it was a slave cemetery. Was it a name on a headstone? Did they know it was there before they started digging, and no one said anything about it until they actually found it?

* * *

I suppose it was a rather idyllic scenario, a fancy restaurant next to the beach, rolling waves and attractive people walking around, but for us, there was something eerie going on. Part of it had to do with the way we were able to go from the restaurant to the beach without a problem, even if we were soaking wet and as salty as the rims of our margarita glasses. And the people who were walking around—that seemed to be all they were doing, walking around. Even the man with the gray beard, who didn’t look much older than us. He was really, really attractive, and Evan thought so too. He was walking around farther away from the restaurant and the beach; if it weren’t for him, I might not have known there was a town nearby. He seemed to be staying away from the waiters. He didn’t avoid us.

It was clear that he was selling weed. No one else seemed to know what he was doing. I think that’s why he was staying away from the others but he didn’t mind approaching us. At one point he told us that we could get one eighth for cheap but two for half that. Buying in bulk is always better, he said. I knew that. Before we bought any we went swimming. While we were crashing around in the waves, it occurred to me that at that logic, why didn’t we buy three for a third of the price? Or ten for a tenth? It was obvious: the more we bought, the less we spent, so why not buy everything? It should be free, I reasoned, or close to.

 * * *

I’m a little apprehensive about being alone with Bianca. She hasn’t brought up the living situation yet but she keeps hinting at something, and she acts like she wants to talk but won’t bring up the subject. For instance, she walked me to my car the other day and kept saying pointless things as I looked for my keys and opened the door. But then she let me go.

It’s her turn to bring it up, or it would be if we were playing tennis, seeing as I sent the email outlining my opinion and basically inveighing her for picking an apartment I hate (after I signed the lease, of course) and she hasn’t said anything about it yet. I would bring it up but I’m afraid she’s going to say she doesn’t care and isn’t going to look for someone to sublet. But I need to start looking for my own place, if she’ll let me. The good ones will be gone soon.

 * * *

         
What was even stranger about the disturbing headline was that it was completely out of context; it referenced “Manhattan” as casually as one would expect, so I knew that I was somewhere where New York was a standard measurement of place. I didn’t like how it said “they” the way someone who spices up their conversation with clichés does. Don’t they teach you not to use vague pronouns as authoritative figures?

I went back to the newspaper stand to read the rest, after I realized I was more curious than I cared to admit, but I couldn’t find my way back. It was near, I remembered, where we met the gray-bearded man. It was a red box that asked for a quarter in exchange for the daily newspaper. A square red box about waist-high, like a little pet. It was the only red thing around, except the restaurant’s carpet, which, now that I think about it, extended out to the patio.

Of course, being thwarted in my search for the rest of the newspaper article, in addition to being mildly annoying, only enflamed my curiosity.

 I don’t know where Bianca was during all this. Hopefully she was at her wretched new apartment, learning to love to be alone so she wouldn’t want me to move in.

I took my friend Avery to the art museum to look at paintings on his day off. I think he enjoyed himself, but it was hard to tell if we were looking at the same things.

'Look at this texture,' he said at one stop, admiring from behind the velvet rope the frame around a painting. 'It's exquisite.'

'No, it's plastic,' I said, and tried to explain where the real art was.

He tried to like the painting, I could tell, but his eyes kept sliding away, this time down to the velvet rope itself.

'It's beautiful!' he cried, stroking the velvet and watching it change colors as he went with and then against the grain. 'How does anyone make something like this?'

I had to admit, I had no more idea if how to make velvet than how to paint a painting.

In the gift shop, we both picked out a few postcards to send home. I think he only bought them to please me, because as we walked out, he gave them to me, then carefully smoothed the bag they came in, folded it, and placed it in his wallet for safekeeping.