The old mantel clock chimed seven times as I took off my pearl necklace and put it back on again. In the mirror, the tips of my ears were flushed, a new lily-of-the-valley brooch pinned to the collar of my light apricot knit sweater—but something still felt missing. Until I spotted the faded glass candy wrapper on the table—the orange wrapping from the hard candy he’d pressed into my hand on the first snowy day last year. My fingertips had just grazed its edge when my phone screen lit up: “Under the third jasmine pot on the balcony.”
Pushing open the rusty iron gate, twilight gilded the climbing ivy in golden edges. As we cycled along the old alley, streetlights flickered on one by one. He suddenly turned into a loft café stacked with weathered books, a copper bell dinging at the stairwell corner. By the window, a steaming vanilla latte waited, a wobbly smile drawn in its foam: “The owner taught me to make this—she said it’s a must for couples.” We flipped through yellowed magazines, chatting about childhood adventures with magnifying glasses and his knack for killing cacti, as condensation trickled down our glass cups like silent rivers.
When we parted, the moon hung above the blue-tiled rooftops. He pulled a tin box from his canvas bag. Inside, twenty fruit candies in vibrant wrappers spilled out, a star-shaped glass pendant nestled at the center: “I can’t walk past a candy shop without buying something—I wanted to give you every color in the world.” The cellophane wrappers shimmered like rainbows in the moonlight as he fastened the pendant around my wrist.
The old locust tree rustled in the alley as I walked home, clutching the warm tin. The pendant swayed, casting tiny sparks of light—and I realized the tenderness wrapped in those fragile papers outshone even the summer stars.
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