‍Bob raised his cup to his lips and flinched. “Watch out, it’s really hot.” He picked up a stainless-steel knife and put its handle end into his coffee.

Rachel cringed. She’d never seen anyone do that. “What’s that for?”

“Makes it cooler by just a few degrees, so you can drink it. Works better than just a spoon. Here….” With a flourish of chivalry, Bob dropped Rachel’s knife into her coffee.

“Might take a minute to cool down,” he said with cheer.

Rachel thought she saw others at nearby tables see the weirdly angled knife blades sticking up from their cups.

Their coffees sufficiently cooled, they spent a few minutes talking about what they’d seen in the museum that afternoon. Rachel seemed in a hurry to finish her coffee first. She moved her purse onto her lap where he could see it, hoping that Bob would get the hint that she wanted to leave. After waiting in vain for him to respond, she put on her gloves. She waited a few more moments. Boy, this guy doesn’t pick up cues. “We should get back to my parents’ hotel.”

 They rode back in silence. At the hotel, Bob hugged Ester and Joel a final time and shook hands with Rachel. “Great afternoon. Really enjoyed it.”

 “Yeah, me too,” she lied. “Thanks.”

From the oversized envelope she pulled out a watercolor. On the back was written “R.C.L. Moore, Jr. Lt. USN, Chicago 3/14/1944.” That was the day they had met at the restaurant near the Art Institute. She guessed he had made it from memory later that day, after he’d returned to his hotel. It was the first artwork she ever held by an artist she personally knew.

The watercolor was just abstract enough to convey life and vibrancy, and its balance, proportions, and perspective were exquisite. It showed the view from the Oak Street beach, looking east across Lake Shore Drive and out to Lake Michigan. The centerpiece was the calming lake itself. The sun had risen, so a new day had begun. Around the bases of the trees, yellow daffodils had popped out through the snow. A child’s yellow kite with a whimsical rag tail danced in an early spring breeze, a symbol of hope she was sure Bob intended. Aside from the strollers on the beach, the only figures recognizable as people were a silhouetted man and woman seen from the back. They sat on a park bench, their heads leaning together as they gazed at the jeweled shimmer that connected them to the far horizon where sky and water met. To Rachel, the scene suggested the two were talking about the possibilities in their future together, as limitless as the expanse before them. 

With the sky and lake so prominent, the painting’s dominant color was blue in countless shades. Rachel remembered telling Bob at the restaurant that this was what she liked about Chicago, that everything was so blue. As she studied the couple in the watercolor, she now understood his comment that blue was “honest.” In her eighth-grade art class, her watercolor set had contained only a handful of basic colors that had to be mixed to make new shades. She examined Bob’s work more closely. Its joy and optimism came from its unique mix of colors, each strong yet very different.

On seeing Bob, Rachel’s dark eyes lit up like twin Fourth of July sparklers. Her upswept hair showcased her high cheekbones and graceful neck. Her metallic green dress was form-fitting, mermaid-style, with enough décolletage to suggest but not look excessive. Her shoulders were bare. A simple pearl necklace and matching earrings contrasted with her complexion and illuminated her smile and eyes. In honor of the evening, she had fastened a small pin shaped like the boot of the Italian peninsula to her dress. When she stepped forward to greet and kiss him, her dress accentuated slim, swiveling hips and legs. Picasso in his cubist phase, Bob smiled, would also see an emerald below and a diamond above, faceted, radiant, alive.