The Tiger Catcher. Paullina Simons

      The children: Brandon Jr. and Rowan, followed by Harlan, Julian, Tristan—Irish triplets, one born every ten months—and then Dalton, ten years later. His parents still lived in the same starter house they’d bought right out of college. His mother raised six kids in it while also running the guidance department at the high school, unstoppable “like a Viking.” His father had been head of the school district and was now president of a local college. As a kid, Julian read and watched sports. He went to UCLA. Ashton was his freshman roommate. They’d been friends ever since.

      “Is that it?” she said.

      “Pretty much,” he said.

      “UCLA and that brings us to today? I know you’re not twenty. What did you major in?”

      When he didn’t immediately reply, Josephine laughed. “I bet it was English.”

      “My parents were paying for my room and board, what was I going to do?”

      “Major in English and become a teacher, obviously.”

      “Am I a teacher?”

      “Yes—in your secret heart, Julian, I bet you are.”

      “Trust me, Josephine, in my secret heart, the last thing I am is a teacher.” Julian squinted at her, the button-eyed waif, the vision with the long blowing hair, the teasing girl with the constant smile on her lips. It was hot, and as they chatted and she swirled the straw around the bottom of her shake, he debated if it was too soon to ask her to go with him to Zuma. It was a hefty drive to Malibu, but the sun would set as they swam. The beach was secluded, and at high tide the waves crashed hypnotically against the shore. Too soon?

      Was it too soon to invite her to his apartment, a few blocks away, and watch Marlon Brando bring on the apocalypse in Vietnam? Was it too soon for a scenic drive on Mulholland? Comedy at the Cellar? Dinner at Scarpetta? Tea on his sofa? A walk to the jewelry store? Was it too soon to place his lips against her alabaster throat, God, what wasn’t too soon.

      “Even superheroes need steady and loyal sidekicks,” he heard her say. The word superheroes rerouted him back to Sunset Boulevard and their small squat table. “In your formula, what am I?” Julian asked. “The superhero or the sidekick?”

      “Maybe you’re the superhero and I’m your sidekick.”

      “Or you’re the superhero and I’m your sidekick.”

      Her grin was wide. “I bet Ashton’s right about you. You’re the superhero who pretends he’s the sidekick so no one notices his powers.”

      “When did Ashton say this, and what powers might those be?”

      “You tell me, Julian Osment Cruz.”

      He narrowed his eyes at her animated face, trying to hide from her not his powers but his weakness. She was so fresh and funny, so red-lipped and delightful. He loved how to hear her, how to hear every sound that sprang from her mouth, he had to lean almost across the table. He loved that her every breath drew him closer to her. He loved her clean unpainted nails, her long fingers unadorned by rings. He wanted to touch them. He wanted to kiss them.

      She was a wonderful audience. She had a great laugh. Was it terrible of him to want to do other things to her that he knew might delight her, to impress her with some of his other skills besides joking and finding great food in L.A.? What a brute he was. Making a girl laugh while fantasizing about other kinds of love. Wishing to give her pleasure in all ways, physical and metaphysical. The desire was strong and would not be bargained with. Lust and tenderness rolled around the crucible inside him, their mercury rendering him mute. At the Griddle Cafe!

      He stared too long at her slender fingers, and in the shadows cast by Sunset, he thought he saw a white circular mark around her fourth digit. He blinked. Nope, nothing there but a trick of the light.

      “Who are you, Josephine?” he murmured. I want to know you. I need to know who you are. I’m here. Do you want to know who I am? He nearly reached out and took her hand across the table.

      She drew a breath—he wanted to say she drew a sexy breath, but that was the only way she knew how to draw it—and misunderstood him. He wanted real, she gave him fantasy.

      “Maybe Mystique?” she said.

      Happily he assented. “Yes. You are Mystique.”

      “Yes,” she said, but less happily. “I’m the blue girl, and my body is a green screen. I disappear when I need to and turn up as someone else in another city, not this one, and not my own.”

      Julian was about to pursue that analogy, but the annoyed hipster waiter informed them that the place was closing, “like forty minutes ago,” and could they please close out their check, because he was off shift “like forty minutes ago.” Julian checked his watch. It was after four! “What do you do to time,” he muttered, taking out his wallet.

      “What do I do to time?” she said. “But it’s not too early to start thinking about dinner.”

      “Agreed. I’m quite hungry myself.”

      They were next to Rite Aid pharmacy. Rush hour traffic was heavy on Sunset. Across from them, up on a hill, stood the legendary Chateau Marmont. They both stared longingly at it.

      “Where should we go?” she asked. “For dinner, I mean.”

      He looked over her shorts, her boots.

      “What, my outfit’s not good enough for dinner at the Marmont?” She did a hair flip. “Just kidding, I don’t want to eat there. John Belushi ate there and look what happened to him.”

      “Um …”

      “No such thing as coincidence,” she said. “Lessee, where else can we go where I don’t have to get dressed up?”

      “The beach?” he said. “The restaurants there are pretty casual.” Was it too late for a swim and a sunset at Malibu?

      “Beach is good.” Her eyes were half-hooded. “Anywhere else?”

      He thought about it. “We could go to Santa Monica. Get some food truck grub, eat on the pier.”

      “We could,” she said. “Or we could go to a Dodger game. Would you like that?” She winked.

      He played it straight. “Dodgers are away this week.”

      “Probably getting their asses kicked in New York,” she said. “Anywhere else?”

      “You want to go to the movies?”

      “Sure.” She sighed with slight exasperation. “Or … we could go to your place, Julian. Didn’t you say you live around here?”

      “My place?” Julian repeated dumbly. “But there’s nothing to eat.”

      She laughed. “Tell you what,” she said, “let’s go to Gelson’s. Buy some steak. Do you have a balcony? A grill on it perhaps?”

      He didn’t know what to say.

      He said okay. He did have a balcony. And a grill.

      “I don’t have to come over if you don’t want me to,” she said.

      “No, no.” We both know I want you—to.

      “I can’t believe I had to invite myself over,” she said with a headshake as they waited for the light to change on Sunset and La Cienega. He had taken hold of her elbow to keep her from crossing against the light. “I just don’t know about you, Jules. Are you always this polite?”

      Their eyes locked.

      “No,” said Julian.

      They stared into each other’s open faces. He slipped his arm around her lower back, touching the sheer fabric of her white blouse, her bare skin hot under his fingers. He drew her against him. Her breasts were at his chest.

      Before