I put my stuff away and showered. I checked the cable channels. Denise shouted for me to go get the grill started out back. Dave was still on the phone in his office, with the door closed. The grill sat between two garbage cans, behind a box for recycling. I wheeled it a safe distance from the house, went back in, found some matches and lighter fluid, and got to work. Behind me, the sun was starting to set on their neighborhood: Labor Day weekend, barbecue, the whole American scene. I waved to their neighbor, who was wrestling open a patio umbrella. The guy waved back. I was glad I’d come.

The charcoal lit on the first try. The flames went six feet into the air. From inside, Denise yelled, and when I looked up, sooty chemical smoke was pouring through the screen door into the house. I went over and shut the sliding glass door. I wasn’t going to leave the fire unattended. Dave came out and, without speaking, got a garbage-can lid and dropped it on top of the fire.

I said, “What are you doing? What the hell?”

He pointed his thumb to a large object standing beside the glass doors, covered by black plastic. He was panting. He said, “We have a propane grill. We don’t use that one anymore.”

“Oh,” I said. He walked over and lifted up the plastic cover. I said, “I didn’t see it.”

He said, “Were you planning to burn down the neighborhood?”

“It’s supposed to be a big fire.”

“The propane one is safer.”

“O.K.”

“All you’ve got to do is click the thing here. Let me do it. Why don’t you go unpack, man?” It was a new deluxe stainless-steel grill. I watched him press the button, and I went back inside.

Dinner that night was amazing: some of the best salmon, everything carefully put on the plates, baby asparagus and shredded yellow something; stuffed clams, eggplant on the new propane barbecue with a marinade, fancy California wine. Denise had become this vicious cook. She’d baked rolls, and made this cheesecake with a design in it. She said she’d taken a class at the high school and then gone back and taken all the other classes.