“I see.” Mrs. Bennett sits back on the sofa. She pulls the pen off its Velcro patch and reattaches it. “Well, how are things? I noticed you and Frankie have a little project going on in the backyard.”

“That’s just a picture he’s drawing.”

“It’s her portrait,” Frankie says, emerging from the kitchen and drying his hands on a dish towel. “It’s for when the Visitors arrive.”

“Oh, are you expecting company?”

“Big-time,” Frankie says. “You know, Mrs. Bennett, there’s no reason to worry about brain tumors from those cell phones.”

She laughs gently. “There most certainly is.”

“I mean, it’s not hard to prevent them. But we need that tower. The Visitors are going to want to communicate with us, when they get here.”

“Well, they can pick up a landline like anybody else.”

“No they can’t,” Frankie says, raising his voice a notch. “They won’t be connected. And it only makes sense to do whatever we can to understand them, after they’ve traveled all the way across the galaxy. Right, Mom?”

“Oh,” Teresa says. “Maybe.”

“I forgot my pills.” He turns around and walks back into the kitchen.

Teresa looks at her lap and scratches lightly behind one ear.

Mrs. Bennett asks, “What was all that about?”

“The thing is,” Teresa says, “I don’t have anything against the tower. I really don’t have an opinion on it one way or the other.”

“Then why not just sign? Come on, Teresa, you’re talking to the woman who shut down the phone company parking lot for two hours. I can certainly plant myself here until you buckle and put your name on this piece of paper.”

Teresa doesn’t want to sign, but the thought of Mrs. Bennett staying much longer is unbearable.

Pill bottles rattle. Mrs. Bennett glances toward the kitchen. Then she leans forward and lowers her voice. “May I ask you something?”

Teresa nods.

“Is he … okay?”

“What do you mean?”

Mrs. Bennett taps one fuchsia temple of her glasses.

Feeling the muscles in her forehead tighten, Teresa says, “In my book, he is.”

A moment later, Frankie comes back around the corner wearing an aluminum foil helmet. He’s twisted the foil into antennalike horns at both corners of his forehead. “This’ll block the cell phone signals from getting into your brain,” he says. He has the roll of foil in his hand.

Teresa watches Mrs. Bennett’s eyes widen.

“But I really need that tower,” Frankie says. “If they use electronic signals to talk to me, I have to be able to receive them.”

“Who are they?” Mrs. Bennett asks.

“The Visitors.”

“Frankie.” Teresa turns around in her chair. “I don’t think Mrs. Bennett is interested in the Visitors.”

“Should I be?” Mrs. Bennett asks.

“They’re nobody,” Teresa says.