The way he spoke now had changed; he used the word outstanding, the word sequentially. The last time I saw him was at this brunch fund-raiser he made me go to; he’d been bingeing on wheat-grass pills for four days and had stomach cramps and diarrhea but he said he felt “fantastic.” And the way he acted now—in the last year and a half he went from a young power-hungry sellout to, like, my uncle Denny with the fat gut and the sweaty sheen, wetting his shirts, singing corny show tunes into my answering machine. “I’m sorry I called at such a late hour, the next time I do I’ll bring you a flower.”

Seeing him, the rare times I got together with him now, passing by his office at the Capitol, stopping at his house to be yawned at, or snored at, was like visiting his grave. Niloo would watch his snoring nostrils—he looked like a gorilla—and go, “He flies pretty high, doesn’t he?” or “Guess who phoned us last night.” In the old days I could get up and go home. Now I had to listen to his bullshit from her too, swallow it twice.

PHYLIDA AND I stepped out on the balcony. White-painted wicker chairs with cushions, a table warped by weather, suspended on three legs. Two guys stood on the balcony next to ours, doing what we were doing, feeling the air. They were Italians, friends of Bob and Niloo’s, also just arrived. Both guys were tan, had facial hair, wore mirrored lenses. They’d changed into swimming stuff and were ready to go down to the beach. They looked like a couple. One guy wore a very fine loosely woven shiny multicolor sweater in the zillion-degree sun. He fingered his webbed beach purse. The other guy had clean-shaven legs which were flawless and brown. The guy with the purse said, “We met them vacationing at a place like this in Lisbon.” He said this to the air in front of him. I had a panicky urge to figure out when Bob and Niloo had been to Lisbon, but I couldn’t picture what continent Lisbon was on so I said, “What kind of place was that?” Both guys smiled at once. I’d been holding Phylida’s hand, and brought it up and kissed it.