On a busy afternoon in the park, two lovers stopped in front of the gleaming brass fountain. She asked him for a coin.

He pulled one from his pocket and handed it to her. “What will you wish for?” He had to raise his voice just short of a yell to be heard over the drone of leaf blowers and shouts from a nearby soccer match.

She didn’t say.

The dime hit the water with a splash and then stopped, as if frozen in place. Little droplets of water hung suspended near the surface and glinted in the silent sunlight.