We walked to M’s boss’s apartment building. It was one of the old-looking ones along the lake. It had a wrought-iron elevator in the lobby like a bird cage you closed yourself into. We rode it all the way to the top and stepped out in front of a tall white door with so much inlay and moulding that it looked like a maze, only it was perfectly made and so, of course, there was no way out. As we wrestled with the stroller, fighting with E who wanted to run ahead, M’s boss’s wife opened the door.

She was wearing a white dress that fell down her body like a waterfall, like a miracle, touching her just here and here. There was a panel cut out of one side, where a pocket would have been but which instead made a paneless window to a tan hip, the bone running just so. The perfect accessory, more unattainable than the latest this or that. A place for her, or for someone else to rest a hand. Oh this old thing, she could have said when she walked and showed it, how perfect it was, the dress, the hip. It was impossible to believe that she’d just had a baby, wearing white, wearing that dress.

M leaned in to kiss her cheeks, three times. It wasn’t really kissing, more touching. They smiled at each other like people who have eaten dinner together. I could see this. As he leaned in to kiss her he touched her shoulder like a man who knew whether she liked a cocktail first, or wine. But of course they had all eaten together, many times after work. I knew this, that M’s boss’s wife often came along at night when they went to restaurants, meeting them after she left her office.

M’s boss came out behind her, the baby on his shoulder, holding a hand out for M to shake. We were welcomed inside, walked through double doors, asked to sit. M took B out of the stroller and M and M’s boss looked at each other and laughed. Tailored shirts, wool pants, leather shoes, men with things to do. Men who could at that moment have called any number of people, who had at that moment many things to do, and there they were holding babies. That was a cue for the women, meaning me and M’s boss’s wife, to smile at each other, to pass on some sort of congratulations to each other, here we were, two lucky women, something like that. We did smile, we took our cue just fine.

Just inside the door, E asked where the tea was, stamping her little patent-leathered foot, and so we were all given another opportunity, the adults I mean, to look at each other knowingly and laugh. There was often, almost always, only one way for these sorts of afternoons to proceed. The smiling, the laughing, the knowing looks, the hand held out just so, come in please!