9:42 P.M.

CONRAD AND I ARE BACK INSIDE, and dinner is in full swing. Robert hasn’t said anything else; we’re still processing. But Conrad comes back boisterous—clearly infused with the night air.

“More wine, mon cherie?” he asks Audrey.

She nods, her cheeks red. Her eyes settle on him as he pours, and I think that maybe Audrey Hepburn is developing a crush on Professor Conrad. Crazier things have happened tonight.

I’m hyperaware of Tobias to my left. I need to figure out what went wrong, to sort through it so that we can find our way back to each other. I feel compelled to tell him, to have him in this with me, but I’m not sure it’s time yet. I look over at him. He’s cutting a scallop with his head down, the way I know he does when he’s really considering something. Tobias was never great at multitasking.

“Hey,” I say. Just so he can hear.

He looks up at me like he’s astonished to see me there. “Hi. How are you?”

We both laugh. It’s an insane thing to ask.

“This is so strange,” I say.

“Is it?” he asks.

“Of course it is. We’re sitting at a table with Audrey Hepburn.”

“Oh.” He turns back to his meal.

I keep my voice low. “What?”

“Nothing,” he says. “I thought you meant us.”

I swallow. “That too,” I say.

He smiles at me. That smile that used to stop me dead in my tracks. That used to strip me of sanity and clothing in the middle of any fight. And I think maybe he knows, too. Maybe he thinks we’re here to get back as well.

“The food is really something else,” Conrad says a little too loudly. “Truly divine. Has anyone tried the pasta?”

Jessica waves her hand in the air. She’s twirling some tagliatelle around her spoon. “So good,” she says through a mouthful.

“We really should have done this before,” Audrey says, and the whole table bursts out laughing. I think, for the first time, as I look around, that maybe this wasn’t such a bad idea after all. That maybe something important can and will happen here tonight.

“Too true, too true,” Conrad says. “Audrey, entertain us. It is mealtime, after all.”

“With what?”

“You know, when you were little, your mother used to sing ‘Moon River’ to you?” Robert says, like he’s just now remembered it. The rush in his voice is excitement.

“Is that so?” Audrey says.

“I love that song,” Jessica says. “We danced to it at our wedding.”

I remember Jessica and Sumir swaying to Shania Twain, but I don’t say that now. I know she’s not lying, not intentionally. Jessica, for all her judgment and opinions, doesn’t have the best memory.

“That was our favorite,” Tobias says. Under the table I feel him reach for my hand. He squeezes once and then lets go. But the contact has been made. My whole body feels like a sparkler.

“Sing for us,” Conrad says.

Audrey blushes. “Oh, no, no. I couldn’t. There are people around.”

“Nonsense,” Conrad says. “They don’t mind.”

He stands up and claps his hands together. The restaurant falls silent. Waiters pause, mid-serve. Conversations halt. Wineglasses are suspended in hands mid-sip.

“Would it trouble anyone if my dear friend Audrey here sang a little tune?”

As if on cue, everyone swings back into motion. Sounds rush back in around us and people return to their meals.

“See?” he says. “It’s no bother.”

Audrey pauses. I can see she’s considering it. And I hope she says yes. I want to hear her sing. It feels important, somehow. Her presence here is not just levity but something else, too. Audrey, for me, represents a time in which things were better. My parents together and Tobias and I—happy and in love.

“I’ll be off,” she says. “I haven’t done it in so long.”

“Just give it a go,” Conrad says. He squeezes her shoulder in a gesture of support.

And then she begins. Her voice is angelic, no more than a whisper, but it’s somehow richer and more authentic than it was in the film, or in the recording I have in my iTunes. I get the feeling that the people surrounding us can’t even hear. It’s like as soon as she begins we’re on our own island at sea.

“Moon river, wider than a mile…” As she sings I am transported to a time many years before this one—before Tobias or Jessica or Professor Conrad. It’s just me and Robert and Audrey. Her voice, its own memory. There is silence when she finishes, like a cloud of something delicate, spun cobwebs or gold, hangs over our table. Even Conrad seems at a loss for words. It’s Robert who speaks first.

“That was wonderful,” he says. “Thank you.”

She reaches across the table and takes his hand, and I see that, for the first time in my life, my father is crying. We are split open in the wake of Audrey’s voice, every one of us. What will flow into the cracks we do not yet know.