“Yes,” laughed Laura, “we have lots of ology in our house.” She was feeling better. Bob really was easy to talk to, once she got over her fear of saying the first thing. “You have three sisters?”

He nodded. “All older.”

Laura laughed. “Wow. Were you incredibly spoiled or totally pushed around?”

He pulled a face. “I had a choice? I got both, depending on the day.”

“What’s the gap?”

“Small, between all of us.” He smiled and sipped his coffee. “My mom is very efficient.”

“I hear that, my mom is, too. I’m the baby, my three brothers are all older.” She grinned at him. “We’re a matching pair: teachers’ kids, baby of four, only one of our gender . . . Did you have a dog growing up?”

Bob nodded. “Yes, a mutt called Rusty.”

Laura crowed, “We had a mutt called Lemon.” She held up her finger. “Wait, let me clarify, we didn’t have him, my grandmother had him, which was nearly the same thing.” She could still remember long summer afternoons lying on her bed with Lemon, the smell of his fur when she buried her face in his side, which she did quite frequently. She realized there was a little of Lemon in Herbert; they both had that kind of erratic fur that looked like they’d accidentally gotten thrown in a hot dryer.

It was at that moment that a kerfuffle broke out over by the entrance to the Denny’s. They both looked around. A small crowd had formed around the claw machine, and judging by the crowing and yelling, someone had just won something.

Bob grinned. “One of my sisters once won five hundred dollars on a claw machine.”

“I thought they were all rigged,” said Laura. “I read an article that said the power is only sufficient to win a fraction of the time.”

“You shouldn’t believe everything you read,” said Bob. “It’s absolutely a game of skill.”

“No way,” said Laura.

“Yes way,” said Bob.

They looked at each other and then, as one, got to their feet.

•   •   •