At 104th Street, a hidden rose patch blinked pink-green from behind rust-red foliage. Witch hazel and the magenta cones of butterfly bush appeared beneath the graceful boughs of maples shadowing empty gray-wood benches. Beside an erupting marble fountain, every petal looked animate and friendly. Resting together on a lonely bench, I asked Justin for his thumb. I doodled a strange constellation made of five star-swirls over the raised veins on the back of his hand with a blue pen. “This is kind of morbid,” he said, looking at the navy design, “but if you died today, I would have to get this as
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