"What kind of help?"
"Better if we don't talk about it over the phone."
"Are you in Orange County?" I asked.
"Yes, Irvine."
"I'll meet you in an hour at The Block in Orange. The world's third largest Starbucks is there."
"No shit?"
"Actually, I was using hyperbole. But it's pretty damn big."
He made another snorting sound over the phone and I could almost hear him grin. "Okay," he said, "I'll meet you at what may or may not be the world's third largest Starbucks."
Whoever he was, I liked him already. I told him to look for the dark-haired girl in the wide-brimmed sunhat.
"Sunhat?"
"I like to look fashionable. My goal is to block out the sun for anyone standing within three feet of me."
He laughed. I noticed his was a hollow laugh. Empty. There was a great sadness in him. And it had to do with someone he had lost. My sixth sense was getting stronger, true, but it didn't take a psychic to figure this one out.
"Well, we all need goals," he said. "I'll look for the dark-haired girl in the wide-brimmed sunhat causing her own solar eclipse."
This time I grinned. "Well, moons and eclipses do go hand-in-hand."
He gave me his name, which was Stuart, and I verified his cell number should he fail to find the world's third largest Starbucks and the giant sunhat shading half of Orange County.