I put my head down next to his, align our ears. “Ahhh,” he says. “I feel it.”

He’s not the only one.

Over the loudspeaker comes the low voice of the librarian telling patrons to bring to the desk the materials they want to check out; it’s closing time. Chip looks at me. “Guess that’s that.”

“We can come back again.”

“Oh well, what for?” He stands, tucks in his shirt, rearranges the kerchief on his head. Everything has shifted.

We walk down the steps to the first floor, see a couple probably somewhere in their eighties walking arm in arm out the door. Their heads incline toward each other: old love. I imagine their house, their bed, the dust on the windowsills that neither one of them can see anymore, the bowl of oranges on their kitchen table, photographs albums stored on the high shelves of their closets.

And now, just ahead of us, a mother with two young children dressed in look-alike pajamas. She is carrying an armload of children’s books, telling her two girls that if they don’t start moving faster, they won’t have time for another story before bed. Then, lunging suddenly toward her younger, a toddler who is moving away from her toward an open display of birds nests, the mother drops her books. Some land at her feet, others a good distance away, near us. Chip picks up a few, hands them to her. She smiles and distractedly thanks him, but when she looks up and sees his kerchief, her face fills with pity. And fear. She will not reprimand her children about anything for the rest of the night, I know. She might hug them so tightly before they go to sleep that they will pull away in happy confusion.

Chip stands taller, raises his chin. I want to take his arm, but instead just move closer to him.

We say nothing on the way to the car. Then, as we pull away from the library, I say gently, “So, I’ll just take you home, now, all right?”

A moment. The deejay on the radio exuberantly announces the weather for tomorrow. Hot and humid. “If you don’t mind,” Chip says, “I’d like to come home with you.”

My heart lifts.

“See Diann.”

“Oh, uh-huh.”

“She can take me home later.”

“Right. That’s fine.”