Jim glanced at Leo, then tapped the spatula on the grill.

“She had a good imagination.”

“Yes she did.”

“You must miss her a lot.”

Jim nodded. “Why’d you ask about the roses?”

“Nothin’.”

Jim turned over two patties. Orange and green flames flared up into the grease drippings of one of them.

“I read this one where she was talking about me being a dead goat and an old leaf.”

“That’s her.” Jim took a tin platter from the hood of his car and flipped the smoking hot dogs onto it. He turned over the burgers again and pressed down on them with the spatula. “Your mother believed when we pass on, we all go back to where we started and live again. That’s why she doesn’t want us wasting our time up at the St. John’s cemetery.”

“Oh.”

Jim glanced at Leo, but only looked as high as his knees before he turned his attention back to the grill and flipped the patties onto the tin.

“You should go out on a date.”

“You think so?” Jim didn’t look up and his voice sounded relaxed and respectful, the way it did around Ryder and his buddies.

“You might have fun.”

“I already did, son. I already did.”

They ate in the parlor in front of the window fan. Jim looked over the paper as he chewed. Leo finished off a hot dog and a hamburger and was reaching for another when Ryder walked into the kitchen carrying two six-packs of beer and no harmonica harness. He said Lars would be along in a minute with the TV so let’s make it fast, Young Buddy, you play and I’ll listen.

Outside, Leo sat on the hood of Ryder’s Impala. It was hot under his legs and felt good. He played “The Love Abode” for him in three separate keys, then sung and played it in two more. Ryder stood back in his short-sleeved cowboy shirt, his thin arms crossed in front of his chest, and he studied Leo’s face and hands as he played. On his exit riff Leo threw in some flutters and a couple of hand-smacks before he capped it all off as loud as his lungs and the harp would let him. Ryder went right in with instruction. Leo had noticed that the better he got, the more picky Ryder was getting with his teaching points. Today it was Leo’s left hand, his holding hand. Ryder said when he got carried away on the high notes, his pinky finger stuck out like a boner, letting precious air out of his fanning cup thereby throwing off his tremolo. “And your hand-smacks are all wrong, Young Buddy; you want to hit them on your off-notes, not the other way around. Ryder took up Leo’s new A harp and showed him what he meant. He let out a woo-wah-ing shotgun of a riff that zipped out into the trees like sound shrapnel.”You want to top ’em on the downside. That adds juice to your high notes, which can already cut through the bull. Got it?”