Chapter Nineteen
Before Cam stole the flyer and ran.
Before I confessed to him under the trees.
Before he first tumbled into my room with Gay Treasures.
We were friends.
Friends friends. The kind of friends who are supposed to stick together, no matter what.
In a city where buildings are changing hands and names faster than a seasonal menu at a fancy restaurant, it’s people we depend on to be constant.
People are the ones we count on not to turn from exposed brick to faux shiplap overnight.
I still remember the way Cam’s hand brushed over my shoulder the morning we discovered that we’d lost Damascus Bread I was being selfish.
And I did act like an asshole when I realized the library had changed.
It doesn’t actually matter if we’re inside a library or an art museum; these clues are just as fragile.
If the treasure hunt falls apart with this next step, it’s not the museum’s fault. Sometimes things just…break.”
We wind through two more gallery rooms before Sunny’s face lights up.
“Hey. Come look at this.” She walks over to a softly lit glass case with several displays of golden-painted pottery.
“It’s kintsugi,” Sunny says.
I step closer and peer at a pale blue serving bowl.
I’ve seen pottery like this before, but I had always assumed the gold lines were painted over the top.
Up close, it’s clear that the pieces of the bowl aren’t quite perfect.
They’re aligned, but not exactly. The gold isn’t just a decoration, I realize—it’s what’s making the whole thing function.
“Is it soldered together?” I ask.
Sunny shakes her head. “No, it’s an incredibly strong lacquer made from tree resin. And then it’s gilded with gold leaf after, to make the cracks pretty. It’s part of sabiru, or wabi-sabi. About celebrating imperfection.”
She turns to me. “Japanese tradition tells us that we’re supposed to look at bowls like this one and imagine the cracks as signs of aging, which is nice.
But sometimes I see the cracks, and I just think of me and all the times I’ve felt broken or messed up.
And the gold reminds me that even though I’m not perfect, there is so much beauty in survival. ”
She shrugs. “I don’t know. That’s probably stupid.”
“No, it’s not,” I say quickly. “It’s not stupid at all. I get it.”
I look at the gold spider-webbing across the ceramic.
For a moment it’s like I can see hands holding the original bowl, cradling it across a room, stumbling, and letting it slip through their fingers.
I can feel the impact of the ground, the way a whole thing instantly becomes a fraction.
I know the heartache of it, the feeling of brokenness Sunny’s talking about.
But then, just like she said, I can see the beauty in it too.
The hands gathering up the pieces. The artist lining each section back together like a puzzle.
The brush dipped in gold, marking each repaired crack like it’s an achievement.
Because it’s not nothing, to fall apart and come back together. The pieces matter. Survival matters.
We’re not stepping back into a time machine with this hunt.
We can’t see it the way Gilbert Baker did when he hid the pieces.
But we’re stitching it together through our lens.
The library is an Asian art museum. The book Gay Treasures came out so long ago that it’s old enough to have a midlife crisis.
And it’s okay. The only way forward is to celebrate the cracks.
I look away from the bowl and smile at Sunny.
“Thank you for sharing this with me. All of this.”