Peter smiled. “I know. Time marches on, the bastard.”

“Where’d you see her?”

“She was hanging out with some summer kids. Here and there.” Island kids always hung out with summer kids: the infusion of new blood was part of the reward for the long winter. “Just be careful she doesn’t get her heart broken.”

Do u rly think i should go 4 it, thought Joy. Her mind contracted. She wanted to put Maggie’s own heart inside a UPS box with plenty of bubble wrap and Styrofoam peanuts. She wanted to keep it there forever. Safe.

“Let me ask you this, Peter. You’re a teacher. You speak Text, right?”

“I have a passing knowledge of it. I wouldn’t say I’m one hundred percent fluent.”

Joy took a cocktail napkin and pointed at the pen behind Peter’s ear. When he gave it to her she wrote T:)T and pushed the napkin toward him. “What’s this mean?”

He squinted at it. “Oh!” he said finally. “Think happy thoughts.”

That was a nice sentiment. Joy could live with that.

“How strong do you want this drink?”

Hes so much older, she could not live with. A strong drink was in order.

“Strong, but with the strength mainly masked by tropical fruit flavors,” said Joy.

“Got it,” said Peter. “The wheels are turning. Give me just a minute. But don’t watch. That spoils the magic.”

Joy moved her eyes away from Peter and allowed her gaze to roam the length of the bar, where she was surprised to see a solitary figure slouched on a stool. How had she not noticed him when she came in? The more she squinted at him, the more familiar to her he was, and after a full minute she realized that he was the man who had parked the Le Baron so obnoxiously in front of her parking space the week before. The sad sack! His shoulders were slumped forward in the same way they had been that day, and his head was down; both of these positions suggested an attitude of supplication or defeat.

Who was this guy? Looking at him was enough to make Joy feel depressed herself. Or maybe it was her own life that was depressing her. Maybe it was the thought of lonely year piled upon lonely year, and the starkness of the realization that in five years Maggie would be gone, and, let’s face it, probably Pickles too, that made Joy do what she did next: crook her finger at Peter and, when he bent toward her, whisper, “Make two of whatever it is you’re making, and send one down to that guy. He looks like he could use a lift.”

“You sure?” said Peter. “Because that guy—”

Joy didn’t let Peter finish. She could be a creature of habit every other damn day of the year. But today it was summer, and she was free of her usual obligations, and the sun was shining with a vengeance, and she would not let herself turn into a person whose own daughter would feel sorry for her when she was in college. No, today Joy would dispense a small act of kindness on a stranger who looked like he might need it.