Ed woke the next morning uncertain whether he had dreamed the events of the previous night. Had he actually taken Audra to a Willie concert? Had they actually kissed? He rolled onto his stomach and grabbed the iPhone resting on the floor.

There was the snarky text from Gina, there was the video he took. Ed watched and re-watched it; the pink sunlight bouncing off Audra's hair, the trilling giggle, the throaty French imperative: Écoute. Ed closed his eyes and tried to conjure back every little detail of the night before-the trestle park, the safety rail, the ivy vines and moss growing on the strange parts of the old mill for which Ed had no official name. But when he tried to recall Audra's face, all he could see was the trouble weighing on her brows. I would be happy, Audra had said, if my dad could just see the sunset.

Ed opened his eyes. He was supposed to send the video to Audra so she could send it to her dad. He drafted a text message: Hey baby. Scratch that. Hey Audra. Safe is better than sorry. Here's the video I got of the Willie concert I forgot to send you last night. Before Ed added the video as an attachment, he watched it again, and tried to see it from the eyes of Audra's dad. Almost immediately, he decided it was no good. Ed had filmed the video for himself. He had lingered so long on Audra that he had neglected to get the context for where they actually stood- the trestle park, the blast furnaces, the sunset, the city. Yes, when he zoomed in on the venue, he could hear Willie Nelson sing, but the camera work was shaky and sloppy. Whatever magic that moment held -Audra's homesickness, or the love she felt for her dad- wasn't translated to the screen, at least not when Ed filmed it. He couldn't send a video like that. It wouldn't be fair. It might even misrepresent what Audra had been feeling. Ed certainly didn't want to misrepresent Audra's feelings. Typical, he thought. You talk a big game, but when it comes down to it, you can't do it. You suck at singing, you suck at filming, you suck at being artsy, you even suck at being a meme, Ed told himself, you should stay in your own, normie lane.

As Ed deleted the draft of his latest imaginary text message to Audra, an idea occurred to him. A grand romantic gesture. He would have to plan it, because if he didn't plan it, it probably wouldn't any good. Because good things took forethought.

He climbed out of bed and scrambled to his desk. He pulled his English notebook out his book bag, flipped to an empty page, and wrote out a plan. He spent so long on it, he forgot to eat breakfast. Then he texted Emily to ask for a favor.

She agreed.

***

"So your father says it's impossible," Piruz took a sip of his coffee.

"Yup," Ed set his feet onto the backroom's table, "He said he could understand why someone would want to, but it's still unconstitutional."

"It's just as well," Piruz sighed, "What this place needed was exposure. Food was decent, décor was good, but it was a hole-in-the-wall," he patted a finger against his temple, "Marketing."

"Your money senses were tingling," Ed smirked.

"They don't call me a money medium for nothing."

"There's just this thing I've been aching to know," Ed squinted at the Chipotle logo still taped on the green board, "Who, exactly, calls you a money medium?"

"Mostly my aunt Lida," Piruz laughed, "but it's true, eh? I'm thinking about writing a book. How to be a Money Medium. Help other people develop their own money senses."

Ed's eyes widened at the thought of Piruz on a book cover.

"There's been a three percent decrease in interest about you from PNCs and NCs," Piruz added, "But sales have actually increased eight percent in the last fortnight. You provided just the right exposure El Gringo's needed to create a loyal customer base."

"Sure looks like it," Ed was secretly very pleased that there was a three percent decrease in interest about him. It was only three percent, but maybe normalcy was around the corner again.

"I hired two of the temps for full time. Ivan's got a sous chef now," Piruz listed off each item as if it were a proud accomplishment, printed on an Oberlin diploma, "I got an expert to look at the crack in that load-bearing wall," he pointed his head behind him, in the direction of the front room (and its insignificant northern wall), "The estimate looks good. This is artisanal coffee, you know?" Piruz shook the cup in his hands, "I bought it at Wegmans."

"Is there actually a difference between artisanal coffee and the normal stuff?" Ed lifted his brows.

"The artisanal coffee tastes like success," Piruz leaned back in his chair, "I hadn't had any since I bought this place for Farbod."

"Where is Farbod, anyway?" Ed asked, "I got a favor to ask him."

"Whatever it is," Piruz grabbed Ed's hands over the table, "he'll do it. I'll make sure he'll do it. Anything for our #EnchiladaEd."

"I'll need to talk to him before the sunset today."

***

Ed sat on the front hood of his Malibu, in the most empty of the Linden Steel campus's parking lots. Just as Ed began to wonder if he had been stood up, a silver Honda Accord pulled into the space beside him.

"You made it!" Ed beamed, as Farbod climbed out of his car, "I was starting to think-"

"Yeah, yeah," Farbod rolled his eyes, "Where am I supposed to set up the camera? Let's get this over with."

***

Farbod got a few beautiful shots of the blast furnaces and pink sky from high on the trestle park. Before he filmed the sunset over the city, he turned the camera on Ed, who had brushed out his bedhead, and put on blue jeans and his bomber jacket for the occasion.

"Ready?" Farbod knelt beside his tripod.

"Are you filming?" Ed asked.

Farbod nodded.

"Bonjour there, Audra's dad. I'm Ed," Ed said into the camera, "You, uh, you don't know me, but I feel like I know you, at least through your daughter. She's told me a lot about you," he smiled briefly at the ground, "You have an awesome daughter, by the way, sir, and I'm lucky to be one of her friends."

"I know you don't speak English," Ed continued, "But I'm pretty miserable at French. You know Emily Horvath? Audra's guest sister? She's my friend too, and she agreed to write subtitles for you. So, by the time you watch this, what I'm saying should be on the screen, here." Ed pointed downward, "Anyway, Audra and I were right here the other night, listening to Willie Nelson play a concert over there."

Farbod panned the camera to the Furnace Plaza and back to Ed again.

"And Audra was talking about how you won't be able to visit America like you were planning to, because of what happened at the café. That really sucks, and I'm really sorry all that happened to you. I can see how hard it is on Audra, and can only imagine how hard it must be on you."

Ed rubbed the back of his neck.

"And Audra was saying that she might be happy if you could somehow see the sunset from over here, so I thought I could film it and send it to you. It's not Philadelphia, or New York, or even Dollywood, but it is America, and Audra's told me how much you love America. I know it's not like seeing it in person, and maybe this whole video is stupid, but if it makes you a little happier, it might make Audra a little happier. And that's all I want."

Ed forgot the rest of his prepared speech. His cheeks warmed. Don't blush.

"I guess that's about it, sir. I should congratulate you on raising such an awesome daughter. She's just," Ed blushed, "awesome."

How many times are you going to say awesome? Ed asked himself. Do you want Audra's dad to think you're in love with her? Find the ending. Stop talking.

"Okay," Ed said, "Uh, hope you enjoy the sunset, sir."

He looked at Farbod and sliced his left hand across his neck.

Farbod got a long shot of the sun sinking below Linden Valley's horizon.

***

On the way back to his Malibu, Ed was stopped for pictures by a couple teenagers visiting the Linden Steel campus with their parents. Ed managed to sneak away before a gang of six preteens, with their iPhones extended, could catch up to him.

***

It wasn't until the following Thursday, after a long shift at El Gringo's (though all Ed did was the mountain of his homework at the table in the backroom, interrupted by periods of picture taking and fan meet-and-greeting), did Farbod give Ed the finished, fully edited, video, on a jump drive. Ed had forwarded Emily's French subtitles to Farbod that previous Sunday, along with a Willie Nelson mp3 as the background music selection. Perhaps surprisingly, Farbod assumed responsibility for the delay. Perhaps unsurprisingly, he was unapologetic (he claimed that "perfection takes time").

"Weren't you going to email it to me?" Ed asked Farbod as he stuffed the jump drive into one of his backpack's pockets.

"The file is too big," Farbod shrugged, "It's probably because my camera is HD."

***

When Ed got home from work that night, though he was completely exhausted, he opened the video on his laptop. He was surprised at how well Farbod had filmed the sunset. He had sped up the footage, so that the whole video ended up being around three minutes; long enough for Ed's message and a full rendition of Willie's "Remember Me." The subtitles matched up with the audio as cleanly as Ed could tell (considering he still wasn't very good at French). Overall, it was a very well-done video. He opened up his Gmail account, and drafted an email to Emily before he remembered that the file had to be transported on a jump drive because of its size. Ed quickly thought of a solution. He sent Emily a text message:

The file ended up being too big to email. I figure I can upload an unlisted video to my YouTube account and then send you the link, which you can email to Audra's dad. Good?

A few moment later, Emily responded:

Works fine. I await the final product.

Uploading to YouTube took surprisingly long. In fact, the upload crashed a couple of times, so Ed had to restart from the beginning. On the third and final try, Ed was thoroughly frustrated. He absently clicked through the upload settings and thought about writing an angry email to YouTube, or Google, or his internet service provider or whoever was responsible for the connection.

Before he could open a new window and compose an email, Ed crashed into a deep sleep.

***

Around midnight, Ed's dad came into Ed's bedroom, after noticing the light was still on. He found Ed sleeping on his bed, on top of his covers, laptop on his thighs. Ed's dad shut the computer lid and carried it to his son's desk, completely unaware of the strange miracle then piecing itself together out of likes and retweets and up votes.

***