“You can let me out here, Hank, I need to walk a bit.” Philip turned to me and said, “He’ll drop you wherever you need to go.”

“Thank you.”

Before he got out of the car, Philip said, “And Kate—may I trouble you for one more thing?”

Trouble. His word, not mine.

“Please don’t tell Anna about my friend back at the house.”

TIM

TIM

“I JUST SPOKE TO YOUR FATHER.”

“He’s your father, too.”

“Oh, right. Anyway, Tim, how are you?”

I sighed. Then my sister sighed. In the aftermath of our father’s great unmasking, Sal and I talked nearly every day, trying to make sense of what we’d learned. But lately, we hadn’t spoken much. We’d grown tired of rehashing the mess he’d made, so with each call, we tried to sidestep the myriad of land mines and talk small for a time. For me, these phone conversations proved single-handedly why every family should have at least two children. A good sister or brother can help keep one sane.

“How are you, Sal?”

“Been better.”

“What’s wrong?”

“Oh, the nerve of the man.”

“Yes,” I said warily.

“Their fiftieth anniversary. It’s coming up.”

“Can’t be.”

“Not for another year, but he wants to celebrate early.”

“A whole year early?”

“Yep. Next year Mom won’t remember anything, so he’s probably right. It’s just . . .”

“What, Sal, what?”

“It’s hard to imagine throwing him a party at this point. Mom, though. Mom deserves a parade. Anyway, he kept saying how terrific you were at his retirement shindig. What an amazing MC you were. So I said, but probably shouldn’t have, ‘Let’s have Tim organize your party.’ ”

“You didn’t.”

“I was kidding, all right? I know it’s my turn. Don’t worry. I’ll do it all. But you have to be there. Okay?”

“Just postpone as long as you can.”

“Why, are you hoping he’ll die?”

“I didn’t say it. You said it.”

“So, brother, how are you?”

“I was just going to ask you.”

“Don’t ask.”

“Are you smoking again? It sounds like you’re smoking.”

“Yep. Red broke up with me.”

“No.”

“She did. She left me for a man named Shirley. It’s okay, you can laugh.”

“I’m sorry, Sal . . .”

“I said you could laugh!”

We laughed.

“How are you and Kate?”

“Why?”

“Everybody’s getting divorced or breaking up. It’s just a disaster area out there. I don’t know, it’s probably wrong of me, but you and Kate have, like, the only relationship that I know of that actually works. And to think we have to celebrate our parents just because our feeble mom never had the courage to kick the feckless bastard out.”

“Well . . .”

“You haven’t answered my question.”

“Forty-one years to go, that’s how we are.”

“Now, that’s a party I’d like to plan.”