What he really wanted to say was, Tell me how to make it better! But he knew Caddie had no more idea of how he could do that than he did. That, he told himself, was something else they had in common.

“Maybe we should go back to talking about favorite colors,” Caddie suggested.

Ben laughed. To his surprise, Caddie did too. She drew one leg up, placing her foot on the couch and wrapping her arms around her knee. He recognized the gesture; it was one of Carol’s. So, Caddie had inherited more than just her eyes from her mother. He was oddly jealous to see so much of his ex-wife coming through in Caddie, as though his absence, and not genetics, were responsible for his inability to find himself in his own child.

“Thai,” Caddie said.

“What?” Ben asked, confused.

“Thai food,” Caddie elaborated. “I like Thai food. And Japanese. I pretty much like everything, actually.”

“Me too,” Ben told her. “Except for broccoli. I’ve always hated broccoli.”

Caddie made a face. “Broccoli sucks,” she said firmly. “Mom eats broccoli all the time.”

“I remember,” said Ben.

“It makes her fart something fierce,” Caddie remarked.

Ben smiled. Broccoli, he thought. Is that what we have in common—not liking broccoli? It wasn’t much to go on, but he would take it. At least it was something to start with.

“How about roller coasters?” asked Caddie unexpectedly. “Are you pro or con?”

“Well, I haven’t been on one since before you were born,” Ben answered. “But as I recall, I liked them. In fact, I remember having one of my first fights with your mother about her not wanting to go on one.”

“I figured I got it from you,” said Caddie, sounding almost pleased. “I love them, and Mom would never take me on them when I was a kid. She always had to talk some other adult in line into letting me go with them.”

Ben imagined Caddie seated beside some unknown man, her face filled with joy as she rode the crest of a roller coaster. “I would have taken you,” he told her. “We would have sat in the first car.”

“That’s the best one,” Caddie agreed. “You can’t see anyone else, and it makes you feel like you’re flying.”

Again Ben remarked on the small connections that existed, unseen, between them. Broccoli. Roller coasters. There was nothing unique whatsoever about these things. Suddenly, however, they were immeasurably important to him. They were ties, however insubstantial, to the young woman sitting across from him. If he could just find a few more, perhaps they would not feel like such strangers to one another.

“I guess there isn’t that much to know after all.”

Ben, startled by Caddie’s voice, looked at her. “What do you mean?” he asked.

“Just that there’s not a lot to talk about,” said Caddie. “I guess I’m not that interesting.”