I looked at the house, wondering if I should make a formal farewell. Good manners certainly dictated it, but I didn’t want a fifteen-minute lecture on why I should clean up both the dishes and my life. I shrugged and followed Paige Carrington down the street.

She drove a silver Audi 5000. Either the Windy City Balletworks paid better than the average struggling theater or the Lake Bluff connection supplied money for shantung suits and foreign sports cars.

Paige drove with the quick, precise grace that characterized her dancing. Since neither of us knew the area, she made a few wrong turns in the rows of identical houses before finding an access ramp to the Eisenhower.

She didn’t say much on the ride back to town. I was quiet too, thinking about my cousin and feeling melancholy—and guilty. That was why I’d had a temper tantrum with those stupid, hulking cousins, I realized. I hadn’t kept up with Boom Boom. I knew he was depressed but I hadn’t kept in touch. If only I’d left my Peoria number with my answering service. Was he sick with despair? Maybe he’d thought love would cure him and it hadn’t. Or maybe it was the talk on the docks that he’d stolen some papers—he thought I could help him combat it, like the thousand other battles we’d fought together. Only I wasn’t there.

With his death, I’d lost my whole family. It’s true my mother had an aunt in Melrose Park. But I’d rarely met her, and neither she nor her fat, self-important son seemed like real relations to me. But Boom Boom and I had played, fought, protected each other. If we hadn’t spent much time together in the last ten years, we’d always counted on the other being around to help us out. And I hadn’t helped him out.

As we neared the I-90/94 interchange rain started spattering the windshield, breaking into my fruitless reverie. I realized Paige was glancing at me speculatively. I turned to face her, eyebrows raised.

“You’re Boom Boom’s executor, aren’t you?”

I assented. She drummed her fingers on the steering wheel. “Boom Boom and I—never got to the stage of exchanging keys.” She gave me a quick, embarrassed smile. “I’d like to go to his place and get some things I left there.”

“Sure. I was planning on being there tomorrow afternoon for a preliminary look at his papers. Want to meet me there at two?”

“Thanks. You’re sweet … Do you mind if I call you Vic? Boom Boom talked about you so much I feel as though I know you.”