“Well, I was fucked if I was going to sob in public in front of all those women like your mother, who never had a good word to say about Gabriella,” I said, stung. “But you’d better believe I cried plenty in private. And anyway, Connie, that’s the whole point. My parents loved me. They thought I could succeed at anything I wanted to do. So even though I lose my temper a hundred times a week or so, it’s not like I had to spend my life listening to my folks tell me how my baby sister was wonderful and I was garbage. Loosen up, Connie. Give yourself a break.”

She looked at me doubtfully. “Do you really mean it? After what I said and everything?”

I took her shoulders between my hands and turned her to face me. “I really mean it, Connie. Now how about some coffee?”

After that we talked about Mike and his job at the waste-management plant, and young Mike and his football playing, and her three daughters, and her youngest, who was eight and so bright she really thought they’d have to try to get him to go to college, although Mike was nervous, he thought it gave people ideas that they were better than their parents or their neighborhood. The last comment made me grin to myself—I could hear Ed Djiak warning Connie: You don’t want the kid turning out like Victoria, do you?—but I listened patiently for forty-five minutes before moving my chair back and getting to my feet.

“It was really good to see you again, Vic. I—I’m glad you came by,” she said at the door.

“Thanks, Connie. Take it easy. And say hi to Mike for me.”

I walked slowly back to my car. The heel of my left shoe was rubbing on the back of my foot. I savored the pain the way you do when you’re feeling like crap. A little pain: the gods letting you expiate the damage you caused.

How had I learned the facts of life? A little in the locker room, a little from Gabriella, a little from our basketball coach, a relaxed, sensible woman except on the court. How could Connie have made it through junior high without one of her friends tipping her off? I pictured her at fourteen, tall, gawky, timid. Maybe she hadn’t had any friends.

It was only two o’clock. I felt as though I had spent a whole day loading bales on the levee instead of a few hours drinking coffee with the old folks at home. I felt as though I’d already earned a thousand dollars, and I didn’t even know where to start looking. I put the car into gear and headed back to the mainland.

My socks were still damp. They filled the car with the smell of beer and sweat, but when I opened a window the cold air was too much for my bare toes. My irritation rose with my discomfort: I wanted to stop at a service station and call Caroline at SCRAP to tell her the deal was off. Whatever her mother had done a quarter century ago should decently be left to rest there. Unfortunately, I found myself making the turn to Houston Street when I should have been heading north to Lake Shore Drive and freedom.