“When I was moving stuff a little while ago, I found an old notebook from college,” Lisa said, quickly moving ahead before mentioning why she had been moving her stuff. “It was full of all this detailed analysis of Renaissance sculptures. And they weren’t just notes copied from the board. They were my thoughts on these things. And now it’s all just gone. If you put a gun to my head I wouldn’t be able to tell you about … I don’t even know what. I just looked at it and I still don’t remember the names. Boccio? Is that one?”

“It’s in there somewhere,” I said. I hoped it was, at least.

The ice-cream place came into view, the line of families and dogs stretching around the block.

“C’mon, guys,” I called back to the kids, trying to wrangle them before the line got longer.

“I’ve got to find somewhere to piss,” Mike said. “I’ll meet you guys there in a sec.”

“Why don’t you just wait with us?” Lisa said. “We were having a good talk.”

“Sorry, dear, I can’t be pissing my pants in front of all these respectable folks.”

“Michael, do not go have a drink,” Victoria said.

“I told you what I’m going to do,” Mike said.

“Then take Patrick with you,” Victoria said. “He needs to go, too.”

“Ice cream,” Patrick said.

“Go with your father,” Victoria said. “We’ll be in line when you get back.”

“He doesn’t want to go, Vic,” Mike said. “I’m not gonna drag him screaming into the bathroom with me.”

“You are an incredibly selfish person,” Victoria said. “That’s the last thing I’m going to say.”

“I doubt that,” Mike said. He stalked off in the direction we’d come from.

“Go,” Lisa stage-whispered to me. I jogged half a block to catch up with him, saw him sip from a battered Poland Spring bottle and grimace.

“Cavalry’s here,” he said. “I was worried I’d be trusted on my own for one fucking second.”

He offered me the water bottle, and, forgive me, I took a small, bitter sip. We were in front of Tom’s, the last dive bar left in town. (It was torn down a couple of years later, along with everything else on the block, to make room for more condos.)

“You know I don’t want to babysit you,” I said.

“Seriously,” Mike said. “You want to be able to talk to a person. And all you get is this shit.”