What I wonder is how I’ve managed to find him, this white knight. Life is so random. I would have to be a philosopher to even begin to understand how life isn’t really lived in the big picture, but moment to moment. The big picture was trying to go east cheaply; the moment was when I decided to hop on the back of a Harley behind a total stranger, panic overruling common sense. A woman alone, and this guy might have turned out to be a mass murderer.

I have no idea if there is something happening here between a single mom with a missing dog and a one-legged violinist, but for right now, it’s pretty nice to have his company. I am really not in the market for anything more. I’ve reached the point in life when the need or desire for a permanent fixture in my bedroom is so diminished, I no longer think it’s missing from my life. Still, that arm around my shoulders and the sense of someone else taking care of things is sweet.

Mitch sips at his beer as he patiently fills in all the info for an ad in all the papers. I am suddenly so weary that I can hardly keep my head up. The weight of an entire life believing that my father had turned his back on me has shifted to the weight of knowing that he hadn’t. The relief that at least I know that Mack is alive is almost as heavy a burden as worrying about him. New worries have risen. Having seen him, I may never be able to find him. It is certainly better, knowing for certain that he’s not dead on the side of the road, but also cruel, in fate’s own way, to have him just out of reach.

Just like Tony has been out of reach for the past seven years.

*   *   *

I call the restaurant. I know there’s no way my ex-husband is at home on a Sunday morning. Marcone’s Grill serves one of the best post–Sunday Mass breakfasts in the area. He’ll be there, commanding the troops. This is good for me, because it means the call will be short and to the point and done. Above all, it means I won’t have to chance getting his wife on the phone. Anthony, like me, didn’t remain celibate. Unlike me, he settled down. One of the very few times Tony went east was to attend the wedding. I put him in the charge of a flight hostess and spent the next two days biting my nails until Anthony put him on the return flight.

The kitchen phone rings four times before a female voice answers with a rough, get-out-of-my-way “Marcone’s.”