“Look at what you are,” he said, bringing my attention back. “You and Robbie. You are something real that they can point to and say, ‘I helped make that person great. I held that person’s hand until they could make it on their own. I did something real and irrefutable.’”

Clearly frustrated, he slumped with his long arms on the table and stared at nothing. “I had the chance to be a part of what life is about, and I gave it to someone else, pretending to know about life when all I have is what you can get by looking in other people’s windows.”

Left looking in the window, red ribbons hide my face. I pushed my plate away, not hungry anymore. “I’m sorry.”

Takata met my eyes from under a lowered brow. “Your dad always said I was a selfish bastard. He’s right.”

I moved the spoon in a figure eight. Not clockwise, not counterclockwise. Balanced and empty of intent. “You give,” I said softly. “Just to strangers, afraid that if you give to people you love, they might reject you.” My attention came up, pulled by his silence. “It’s not too late,” I said. “You’re only, what, fifty-something? You’ve got a hundred more years.”

“I can’t,” he said, his expression asking for understanding. “Alice is finally thinking of going back into research and development, and I’m not going to ask her to leave that and start a second family.” A sigh shifted his thin shoulders. “It would be too hard.”

I looked at him, taking my coffee up but not drinking it. “Hard if she said no, or hard if she said yes?”

His lips parted. He seemed like he wanted to say something but was afraid. Lifting one shoulder and letting it fall, I took a sip and gazed out the window. Memories of struggling to live with Ivy and Jenks lifted through me. Jenks was going to be really ticked I’d forgotten him at Trent’s. “Anything worth having is going to be hard,” I whispered.

Takata took a long, slow breath. “I thought I was supposed to be the font of philosophical wise-old-man shit here, not you.”

He was smiling wanly when I looked at him. I couldn’t deal with this right now. Maybe after I had a chance to figure out what it meant. Pushing my chair back, I stood. “Thanks for dinner. I have to go home and get some stuff. Will you stay here until I get back?”

Takata’s eyes went wide in question. “What are you doing?”