She was still twirling the snifter, and I sensed that she wanted to tell me something else, but couldn’t decide if she should or how she would feel about it if she did.

“You’re making me dizzy,” I said, reaching over and putting my hand on her glass. “Tell me the rest of it, Glenna. It’s all right.”

“I don’t want to hurt you.”

“You never did want to,” I said.

“You know that, don’t you? It’s important to me you know that.”

“I’m middle-aged, Glenna. I know everything.” She smiled, and I said, “It’s all right. Go ahead.”

Despite the reassurance, she held back. Then: “I was so grateful to David.”

“For?”

“For the calmness. For—for not feeling the way I did about you.”

“Ouch,” I said, trying to keep it light, yet stung.

“You made me feel like the ground was going to open up and swallow me. I used to get furious with you about it. I would wake up with it.”

“It didn’t seem that way. Not to me.”

“I know, Gordon.” She was quiet again. I noticed her eyes misting up and handed her a napkin. She shook her head. “After David died—right after David died, I felt like I’d cheated him. Like I didn’t love him the way a wife should love a husband. But gratitude is a kind of love, isn’t it?”

“Not the kind on valentines. But, yes—I think gratitude is a kind of love.”

“Maybe the best kind,” she said.

“Definitely the easiest.”

She lowered her head. “Was it that way with you and—Beth?”

“Beth. We dated. We lived together. I married her. I’m not sure I loved her till Alex. I loved her for having Alex.”

Glenna pinned me to my chair with her eyes, and I saw her dissolve backward through her fifties, forties, thirties, and twenties, and then back again to now. It was unsettling, as if my vision had lost its ability to decode past, present, and future.

I said, “Did you ever think about—” and then stopped, embarrassed about asking the question.

“Think about you? Sure. Don’t you believe you were important to me?”

“Sometimes.” I started twirling my martini glass by the stem.

“You still haven’t told me why you’re here.”

“I wanted to go out on a date.”

Glenna shook her head. “I’m … what do they call it? ‘Geographically undesirable.’ And you could’ve been in touch years ago. For God’s sake, you can tell me, Gordon. I want to know.”

“Nothing to tell.”

From her shrug, I knew that Glenna wasn’t buying it. As she drank the rest of her Rémy Martin, she stared past me, with a faraway look in her eyes. I turned and saw that she was staring out the front windows of the tavern, where snowflakes were fluttering through the streetlights as gracefully as silvered butterflies.

“What’re you thinking?” I asked.

“About that winter.”

“Our happy winter?” I said, unable to keep the sarcasm out of my voice.

“It was, Gordon.”