Granny Ng clutched the empty bottle in the dark, hoping she could wait it out. Usually when the young man was at his computer in the evenings, she would time her toilet breaks with his; so far this solution had worked without complications. But this evening, the young man was not doing his part.

The telephone started ringing from down the hall. The young man continued playing his game. Granny Ng silently pleaded with him, Please go to the phone, it might be that young woman! Maybe she’s come to her senses and wants to tell you she’s sorry! Please answer the phone, if only to give her a piece of your mind!

The dealer congratulated him again—“Expertly played!” A few more telephone rings, then silence. Granny Ng sank into despair, and her sympathetic feelings for the young man turned into sharp annoyance. Then she heard his chair roll across the floor and his footsteps leaving the room. Granny Ng seized the moment and quickly unscrewed the bottle cap.

Granny Ng had been holding on for so long that when the time came to urinate, she missed the top of the funnel at first and got the floor of the closet instead. She reproached herself as she mopped up the wet patch with a towel from the shelf. How many times have you done this now! Footsteps again; the chair squeaked under the young man’s weight. For the next few minutes Granny Ng heard little except the hum of the computer, the swish of cars passing on the freeway, and some occasional clicks. He’s probably had enough of the poker, she thought. She was glad he’d quit while he was ahead. Maybe he was reading the news now. She leaned her head against the wall and closed her eyes. She thought about the scrapbook she used to keep for saving her favorite news articles. These were often unusual or uplifting stories, such as the Japanese family vacationing in Kyoto who lost their beloved dog in an amusement park, returned heartbroken to Osaka, and a week later were amazed to find the dog sitting on their doorstep, having miraculously found its way home. In another article, a sixty-three year old British man who’d been blind his entire life claimed to have regained his sight after traveling to Italy and catching his first whiff of pizza.

Granny Ng had kept a special section in her scrapbook devoted to tales of reunited families. Her favorite stories concerned twins who’d been separated at a young age and then reunited under fantastically coincidental circumstances after twenty, thirty, forty years. She thought of the woman from Tokyo who was honeymooning in Niagara Falls with her husband. Lunching at their hotel restaurant overlooking the falls, the woman spilled wine on her blouse and went up to their room to change. Her husband stayed at their table to finish his glass of wine, and, after a few minutes, decided to visit the seafood buffet. Seeing his wife examine the oyster-shaped ice sculpture, he snuck up behind her, grabbed her waist, and planted a kiss on her neck. He was alarmed by her screams, and couldn’t understand why she was shouting at him in English. He was even more alarmed by the angry-looking blonde man approaching them. His confusion deepened when another woman who looked just like his wife joined in, demanding to know what was going on.