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"Double happiness," Willeer
"It’s a popular phrase You’ll see it on restaurants and things I think it has to do with luck In China, it’s apparently big at weddings Probably because of the story of its origin"
"Which is?"
"A youngto take a very iets sick in a e So this , he ht before he leaves, the girl tells him a line of verse The boy heads off to the capital to take his exauess to test him further, he says a line of verse Of course, the boy inizes this irl told hiirl said The eoes back and ets the job and the girl You know, the Chinese are very big on luck"
Willem shakes his head "I think the double happiness is the two halves finding each other Like the couplet"
I’d never thought of it, but of course that’s what it is
"Do you reoes?" Willeainst the sky in the spring rain while the sky set off the spring trees in the obscuration Red flowers dot the land in the breeze’s chase while the land colored up in red after the kiss"
The final section of the canal is underground The walls are arched, and so low that I can reach up and touch the slick, wet bricks It’s eerie, hushed but echoey down here Even the boisterous Danes have shushed Willee of the boat, kicking the side of the tunnel e can
He nudges my ankle with his toe "Thank you"
"For what?"
"For arranging this" He gestures to the boat
"My pleasure Thank you for arranging this" I point above us, to where Paris is no doubt going about its business
"Any time" He looks around "It’s nice, this The canal" He looks at me "You"
"I’ll bet you say that to all the canals" But I flush in the musty, rich darkness
We stay like that for the rest of the ride, swinging our legs against the side of the boat, listening as the odd bit of laughter or round It feels like the city is telling secrets down here, privy only to those who think to listen
Eight
Arsenal Marina is like a parking lot for boats, tightly packed into cement piers on both sides of the water Wille, hopping out to tie the lines in complicated knots We bid farewell to the Danes, who are now truly soused, and I take down Agnethe’s cell phone nu to text her the pictures as soon as I can
As we get off, Captain Jack shakes our hands "I feel a little bad to take your money," he says
"No Don’t feel bad" I think of the look on Wille in the tunnel That alone orth a hundred bucks
"And we’ll take it off you soon enough," Gustav calls
Jacques shrugs He kisses my hand before he helps s Willem
As alk away, Willem taps my shoulder "Did you see what the boat is naht on the back, etched in blue lettering, next to the vertical red, white, and blue stripes of the French flag Viola Deauville
"Viola? After Shakespeare’s Viola?"
"No Jacques rave;, but his cousin painted it wrong, and he liked the naistered her as Viola"
"Okaaay--that’s still a little weird," I say
As always, Willee little treoes up my spine
Willem nods, almost solemnly "Accidents," he confirms
"But what does it mean? Does itbetter or worse would’ve happened to us if we hadn’t taken that boat? Did taking that boat alter the course of our lives? Is life really that randos
"Or does it mean that Jacques’s cousin can’t spell?" I say
Wille as a bell, and it fills me with joy, and it’s like, for the first tihter, to spread happiness
"Sometimes you can’t know until you know," he says
"That’s very helpful"
He laughs and looks at ood at traveling after all"
"Seriously? I’m not Today is a total ano down a single boat Not even a taxi Not even a bicycle"
"What about before the tour?"
"I haven’t traveled much, and the kind I’ve donenot a lot of roo eyebrow
"I’ve been places Florida Skiing And to Mexico, but even that sounds o to this time-share resort south of Cancún It’s iant Mayan temple, but I swear the only clue that you’re not in A the fake river waterslide thing We stay in the sao to the same beach We eat at the saates, and e do, it’s to visit the ruins, but we go to the sale year It’s like the calendar flips but nothing else changes"