They reached Vera’s house and walked along the back path crowded with daylilies that needed dividing. Vera always noticed those sturdy flowers and wondered at her parents’ backyard bickering as to what to plant and where. Coreopsis or Jacob’s Ladder? The creeping phlox here? They practically staggered home from the factory but changed into their denim gardening clothes and trundled out the metal rake and the spade to turn the compost. Vera couldn’t understand their bitter enthusiasm for flowers, for something so decorative and inconsequential, for something that did not contribute, as most everything else of interest to them did, to their security or health. She mistook their civic pride for whimsy. Their botanical efforts reflected their daily wonder at the space at their disposal, so much more space and freedom than in Poland. Vera only saw it as a waste of time, not as an act of will. Her parents planted these hardy ornaments because they could, because here, at least, no one would drive a tank over them. They would not wake to find a bomb planted nosedown like a sculpture among the irises.

Lester pushed the window open and lifted Vera up by the waist. She scrambled for purchase and popped the curtain hooks from the rod before she got hold of the radiator and swung her legs inside. Lester hoisted himself quickly and shut the window. They tried to quiet their breathing and listened for other sounds. There was nothing. Vera sat on her hands, suddenly shy. She looked away from Lester.

“You not still pissed at Simon, are you?”

She shook her head.

“He didn’t mean nothin. He’s just drunk’s all. He gets like that.”

She didn’t look at him or free her hands and leaned her head against his shoulder.

“Something wrong?” asked Lester.

She shook her head again. He put his arm around her. And maybe this is all we need. The gestures of others to surround us. Empty of the rush of words, the salvation of giant acts.

They lay down on the bed and undressed. Vera was matter-of-fact now. They undressed like adults, without the nervous, quivering striptease of teenagers: uncertainty and desire rolled up together so that taking off pants became a negotiation, the freeing of her breasts a promise, no matter how temporary or false. They were wise, were old, too old for their age.

Afterward, in a moment of daring, they leaned out the open window, still naked, to share a cigarette, passing it back and forth instead of conversation, letting the air dry them, laughing at the picture of her stomach, the semen dried there like invisible ink, noticed only by them, laughing in the sulfur light from the street, laughing at the delicate liquid map painted on her stomach.