I stood beside her and got involved in the baking. I rolled the dough into a ball, put the ball in a pan and the pan in the oven. I suggested she shelve the muffin idea for another time. She wiped her face with her apron. I made a pot of tea, and we sat in the new room and drank it, surrounded by glass walls and plants. Denise’s face was puffy. She held a crumpled napkin in her hand. I did imitations of her and Dave yelling: “Denise, where are my damned socks?”—“Gee, I don’t know, Dave, they’re your socks.” Her eyes were bloodshot. Tears poured out and ran down her cheeks when she laughed.

DAVE CAME BACK. He went past us to the sink and got out the bottle of aspirin, without noticing that Denise had been crying. He said he was going back to bed. We followed him as far as the living room. He threw his briefcase onto the couch and sat down on an antique needlepoint chair. Denise sat near him, on the couch, reaching her hand over both of his.

I said, “How did the meeting go?”

“I don’t know.”

“Everything’s O.K.?” I said.

“It’s going good, it’s going good. How does somebody gauge that? It’s going O.K. to me.”

Denise leaned over and kissed his cheek. She combed the back of his hair with her hand. He looked at her and laughed. He wiped his nose. She said, “Did they serve you food or anything?”

“Cookies and iced tea.”

I said, “It wasn’t a long meeting.”

“No. I showed them the new campaign. They bought that.” He looked at the coffee table. “What can I say? We met at the brother-in-law’s house. He owns a Doberman pinscher. Everything went tutto bene. It’s going great. Everybody relax.”

“O.K.,” I said. “Nobody’s asking.”

“They’re boring. Stupid fucking meatballs.”

“Uh-huh,” I said.

“My neck is sore,” he said, and reached back and rubbed it. “It kills me that these people have so much money and I don’t.”

“We have enough money,” Denise said.

“Not like this. It breaks my heart. You wouldn’t believe what the family’s worth—and they’re all morons. The men wear these necklaces. The wives keep getting nose jobs. What a mentality. Did I tell you about their art?”

We said no.