As for Em’s protest plans at St. Patrick’s, I not only said I would go with her—I volunteered to carry the more inflammatory of the protest signs. If I was the one holding FUCK THE DEMOCRATS, maybe the cops or the Secret Service would arrest me first. Maybe a woman in a SILENCE=DEATH T-shirt—even if she’d brought a GOOD RIDDANCE sign to Cardinal O’Connor’s funeral—would be perceived as less of a threat to our fragile democracy. And while Em was putting on her shorts and her running shoes, I reread to her the snowshoer’s repetitious notebook entries on the subject of the First Amendment—knowing Em was as sick of hearing about the First Amendment as I was.

I recited the clause Mr. Barlow had loved best: “ ‘Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion’ ”—that was the clause the Catholic Church ignored. The First Amendment’s protection of “the free exercise” of religion was not in jeopardy, the snowshoer always said. Our freedom of religion was assured. What was at risk, in America, was our freedom from religion, I was saying—when Em kicked off her running shoes, which I had just watched her put on.

“I know,” Em said. I wanted to spare her the pointlessness of her protesting at St. Patrick’s, and she knew it. I followed her into the bedroom, where she took off and kicked away her shorts. Before she got in bed, she took off Nora’s T-shirt. She didn’t have to tell me to put it back in the drawer. “I’ve had enough of the damn déjà vu, kiddo,” Em was saying.

“I know,” I said, sitting beside her on the bed. “I’m still stuck on you, you know,” I told Em.

“And I’m still of the opinion that I would rather be with a penis—with your penis, anyway,” Em replied. “It’s a good thing you don’t have an Oscar, if you know what I mean,” she added.

“I know what you mean,” I said, holding her hand.

When Em fell asleep, I went into the kitchen and decided what to do with the protest signs. I would regret getting rid of FUCK THE DEMOCRATS. Our fellow Democrats would do something to disappoint us again. I had sufficient common sense to keep the GOOD RIDDANCE sign, although I put it on a high shelf—above one of the kitchen cabinets, where Em would need a stepladder to reach it. Maybe that’ll make her think twice about it, I was thinking. But I didn’t doubt that someone would surely die—someone who had it coming. I didn’t doubt that Em would find another deserving candidate for the GOOD RIDDANCE sign.