We can’t impose any longer on the neighbor—she has to report for a shift at the hospital—so I suggest to Mitch that we go find something to do. What I mean is, give Jennifer a head start and then sit in front of the Parmalees’ house until they get home. Mitch isn’t at all for that. It’s a little early for foliage, but we drive around looking at the trees anyway. Then we decide that lunch is a good idea, although I’m too excited and frustrated to do more than move the french fries around on my plate at the lovely little riverside restaurant we find in the next town. I keep my eye on my watch as painfully slow minutes tick away.

“Maybe they’re back.” I just want to be on Old Path Road. I can’t take the chance of not being there when they get home, can’t let them think that I’m not coming back for my dog. They’ll claim that I deserted him.

“Are you going to eat those?” Mitch nods toward my fries and I am struck with the most perfect déjà vu of my life. Artie’s words to me almost exactly.

“Are you going to leave me in the rest room if I take too long?”

Mitch laughs and then pulls a serious face. “No. Never.”

I want to say, It’s what everyone else does to me. But I don’t.

I think Mitch knows he’s hit a nerve, because he reaches across the table and strokes a lock of my hair back behind my ear. A tiny gesture of affection and possession, like a mother might do, or a lover.

We climb back into the car and try to find our way back to the Parmalees’ house, where I am determined to sit until they reappear with my dog.

*   *   *

“I think you missed it.” I twist in my seat and jab my finger at the cockeyed street sign disappearing behind us. We’ve missed the turn to get back to Old Path Road.

“I think we must have come on Cemetery Road from the wrong direction. I was looking for it on my right.” Mitch slows to turn around, using the cemetery driveway. There is a car up ahead of us, in the middle of the road. Mitch throws the car in reverse to back out.

There are exquisite moments in life. When you first see the face of your baby. When a random act means that you meet someone special. When a car stalls and you have a moment to look out the window and see your lost dog.