“What’s the other?” I ask, not because I want to know or believe he’ll follow through on any of them. I ask because it seems polite.

“To write more,” he says. “I’m not getting any younger, and I just need to get some things finished. Get that old fire back. I’ve let that part of my life fall away. I feel sorry for myself. You know, with all the teaching I do and the committees . . . It’s one thing to have helped so many young writers the way I have, but I need to think of myself.”

It’s a familiar litany, one Lance recites almost every day. We approach my office, and while he goes on—and on—about his workload, I start scanning student faces again, hoping not to see Madeline.

“. . . besides, you’ve inspired me, Connor.”

I tune in to Lance again. “How’s that?”

“You wrote your book while you were teaching. Why can’t I write a few poems? Right?”

“Sure. I’m glad to hear you say that.”

“You must have written pretty fast, though,” Lance says. “A book like that. A page-turner. A potboiler. A money shaker. I remember you and me commiserating over drinks just a short time before you got the book deal, and you were saying you’d been in a long dry spell with writing too. That was our bond: that we were both running on fumes. Something turned it around for you because that book came out of you.” He snaps his fingers. “Like magic.”

Every word that comes out of Lance’s mouth is tinged with an archness, a hint that there’s something behind the words that the listener may or may not understand. So I try not to make too much of this casual hallway conversation, but my mind starts to race away from me. Why is Lance asking me about my writing dry spell right after the book has come out? Right after Madeline showed up at my house?

“I guess I felt inspired,” I say.

“Is that the secret? Just . . . inspiration?”

“I guess we all have to keep plugging away,” I say.

“Yeah.” And he laughs, as though I’ve said the funniest thing he’s heard in a month. “We all have to keep plugging away, don’t we?”

He claps me on the back and walks away.

CHAPTER TWENTY

I return home a little after five. On the way, I stopped by the bank and managed to get some information about a second mortgage in order to find money to pay off—or to pay back—Madeline. As conversations about money often do, this one overwhelmed me and made me realize I wouldn’t be able to get my hands on a bunch of cash that quickly.