“I’m good. Running into you two.” He shook his head. “A jubilee is a mysterious thing.”

Sadie splashed water toward both men.

“You live here?” I asked Drew, whom I would not have recognized twenty pounds heavier and bald.

“Yes, I live here. Have since vet school.”

“Lucky you.”

He glanced at Sadie holding a cast net. “You catching any shrimp?”

“I was just about to show Ellie how to use it, but I’m a terrible teacher.”

“Ah …” Hutch puffed up his chest in mock manliness. “I am a pro.”

“I’m sure you are,” Drew said.

“No, really, I am.” Hutch held out his hand. “Let me teach you.”

Sadie shook her head. “Show-off.”

The net was nylon, pearl colored, with small silver gray weights sewn around the edges. When Hutch threw it over the water, it was as if a full moon with a tarnished outline settled into the bay, sinking beneath the surface to surround the school of shrimp. He raised the net and dumped a squirming mass into the bucket. “Wanna try?” he asked.

I shook my head.

“Come on. I’ll show you. This is a small-cast net; you can do it.”

“I don’t think I’m very good at stuff like this.”

“Won’t know until you try.” He stood behind me and put his hands on mine, instructing me how to anchor the net’s rim to my left wrist. His pulled me back to rest, and in my mind’s eye I could see every bend and line of his body, warm and familiar; I sank back into him. Then, grabbing the net halfway down, I held the bottom between my teeth. It tasted of mud and salt and all that forms this earth. He took my right hand and we threw the net over the water like a Frisbee, but it bunched together, landing in a mass of tangles on the water’s surface, slowly sinking. Together we laughed.

“Told you,” I said.

Hutch lifted the net. There were two shrimp; I took them in my hand. The sleek, pale white, almost see-through bodies slid between my fingers. The whiskers tickled my palms and wrists. I tossed them into the bucket.

“So,” he said. “Can we meet sometime tomorrow and make a plan?”

“Absolutely … .”

He lowered his voice as Drew and Sadie talked to each other. “Listen, Ellie. This is about my job. About the exhibit. Nothing else at all. I want to make this the best work I’ve ever done. This is the last thing I have after six months of work on the show.”

I nodded. “Okay, just let me talk to Birdie and find my way into this thing.”

“Great.”

I’d almost forgotten about Sadie and Drew when Drew’s voice announced, “We’d like to catch up, but we’ve been sent on the cooler run.”

“Cooler run?” I asked.