The Big Crunch Read Free Page A

returned to his nonchalant shuffle. He stopped at the corner. She was nowhere in sight. She must live in one of the houses near the corner. Not that it mattered. He didn’t even know why he’d followed her. Just something to do. Stupid. He’d added half a mile to his long walk home.
    He thought about taking the shortcut across Jenkins Park, then decided against it. Izzy lived right on the park. It would be too weird to run into her.
    For nearly eighteen months — an eternity — Izzy O’Connor and Wes Andrews had been monogamous, a constant part of each other’s life. They had talked two or three times every day. Wes had been a regular dinner guest at the O’Connors’. He called Izzy’s mom Mrs. O’C, and he called her dad by his nickname, Hap.
    Izzy had spent plenty of time at Wes’s house too, most often when Wes was drafted into babysitting his sister, Paula, who had recently turned ten and declared herself too old to need a sitter.
    He had only seen Izzy once at school that first day, sitting in the lunchroom with her artsy friends. They were laughing and making things out of straws. That was the sort of thing she liked to do. Always bending and twisting and coloring things to make them look like other things.
    People were always saying what a pretty girl Izzy was, and it was true. Though over the past year her face had become so much a part of Wes’s life that seeing her was almost like seeing his own face in a mirror. Except that at lunch that day — the first time he’d seen her since they’d broken up two weeks ago — her hair had been shorter.
    At Sixteenth Street, Wes caught a whiff of something baking. Something sweet. He turned left and followed his nose to the Bun & Brew.
    The Bun & Brew — “brew” as in coffee, not beer — had taken over an old filling station, still with the antique pumps out front, forty-nine cents a gallon for regular. They didn’t work, of course.Inside, the nostalgia theme intensified: photos of old cars, Formica tabletops, and a working eight-track tape deck constantly playing oldies so moldy they were actually semi-cool. The tables were set up in the old garage bay; the office had been converted into an espresso bar and baked-goods case. A muffin would kill the stomach clench, and it wouldn’t take his every last dime. He shuffled up to the counter. Eight types of muffins, three varieties of croissant, a killer chocolate éclair, and some giant chocolate chip cookies. He always ordered the blueberry muffin.
    “Can I help you?”
    Wes looked up. On the other side of the counter stood Izzy, her face carefully arranged in that tight half smile she used with complete strangers.
    His heart did a
ka-thunk.
    “Iz … you work here now?”
    Izzy nodded, still holding the smile.
    “Cool,” said Wes. A really stupid thing to say because it was not cool at all, her working there, where if he wanted a blueberry muffin, he would have to see her all the time.
    “Blueberry muffin?” she asked.
    “Cookie,” he said, not wanting to be too predictable.
    Izzy grabbed a tissue and got him a cookie.
    “How’s Paulalicious?” she asked. That was her nickname for his sister. Izzy had a nickname for everybody. She’d come up with some really weird ones for him. Like Pookie.
    “She thinks she’s an adult already. Two digits.”
    “Oh, right — her tenth birthday. Tell her happy birthday for me.”
    “Okay.” Wes knew he wouldn’t. Paula was still mad at him for breaking up with Izzy, who she worshipped. He paid for his cookie and stood awkwardly as she counted out his change and handed it to him. She smiled, a real smile this time. Wes felt a smile begin to form on his own face, then realized she was looking over his shoulder. A woman stood behind him, waiting to place her order. Wes stepped aside and carried his cookie to a table, sat down, watched Izzy ring up a coffee and a muffin, stood up, took his cookie outside, and ate it as he walked home.
    He didn’t even really