“Hi, Mom,” he said. She responded with almost embarrassing fervor. He thanked her for the card, told her he was working long hours as usual, told her he still liked his house and the town, and came very close to telling her about Rachel. But the enormity of the gap between his life and hers seemed so wide; there would have to be so much fill-in before he could talk across it. In the end, he told her nothing new.

But she had news for him. “I’m getting married,” she said, almost defiantly.

For a second, Manfred was too stunned to say anything. “Wow, that’s great!” he blurted, desperately trying to fill the silence. “Gary, I’m assuming.”

“Yes, of course, Gary.”

“When will it be?”

“We’re just going to slip off some weekend soon,” she said evasively.

“I’ll come,” he said, absolutely certain that he must make the effort. He owed his mother that much. “Just let me know for sure.”

“Well, we haven’t set a date yet,” she said.

“What are you not telling me?”

“Oh, son, you’re so sharp.” She sighed. “The thing is, Gary’s kids aren’t as . . . agreeable to the idea as you are.”

“Why not? You’re one of the nicest women I ever met,” Manfred said honestly.

She laughed, but only a little. “That sounds like you came up to me at a party or something, instead of me being your mom.”

“Uh-huh,” he said. He waited.

“Well, the thing is, they . . . oh, they’re just silly, stupid people,” she said, in a burst of anger that was as unexpected as it was refreshing.

“Me,” he said, suddenly understanding. “They don’t like me.”

“They don’t even know you,” she said, and the anger was still there, full force. “They just don’t like the idea of you. A psychic. Isn’t that stupid?”

“It’s an excuse,” Manfred said. He’d had more experience with human beings than some people three times his age. “They just don’t want their dad to get married, to you or anyone else. I can bet that if I were super-wealthy, they wouldn’t have any objections at all to what I do.”

“I hate to think that, but I have to say there’s something to it,” Rain said.

“Mom, you’re just barely over forty, so you can have a long and happy marriage with Gary. Go for it.” Rain had been unmarried and in her teens when she’d had Manfred, and she would never talk about his father. If his grandmother, Xylda, had known, she hadn’t said a word. Manfred thought she didn’t know who her daughter had been sleeping with, or she’d have found a way to let him know without actually telling him. Xylda had loved him, maybe more than she’d loved her own daughter, Rain, but she’d loved drama most of all.