“I just want to go over the weekend first, if that’s okay with you.”

“Happy to,” Adam said, realizing for the umpteenth time he had never had a feel for what Don was thinking.

“Have you had a chance to read this Metro project, what, is it slugged …?” Don looked down at his budget.

“The northern-Virginia highway project.”

“ROADSI,” Don said. “It’s, what, four parts?”

“Yes.”

“Has anyone given any thought to tightening the lede?”

“Let me see,” Adam said genially, motioning to a printout of the story Don had marked.

“The lede is anecdotal, and I think that’s a problem,” Don said. “Sure, sitting in traffic is awful. I mean, this reads like any bad-commute story. And there’re some facts way down that I think need to be brought up higher. And the context—how does this compare to other regional traffic dilemmas? But I guess the deeper question I have is, we seem to be saying this is the fault of the governor, and I’m having trouble seeing how we lay this on his doorstep.”

Adam put his glasses back on his nose and looked over them at Don. He gestured for the printout so that Don might hand it to him.

“I mean, can you help me with that?” Don said, unaware of Adam’s hand moving toward his.

“Have you talked this over with Metro?” Adam took his glasses off again.

“No one seems to be over there.”

“I know there was some discussion as to why the top was the way it was, and I don’t remember exactly, so I can’t tell you as much as I’d like.”

“The nut graph. It’s vague,” Don said. “Who was in charge of this?”

“The Metro projects editor. Tom. Tom Simon.”

“No, I mean who really edited this.”

“He did.”

“Not Hank?”

“Steve edited the version from Tom.”

“So Hank was fine with this?”

“Don, I was fine with this. Maybe I could just take a look at your printout.”

“Sorry. I’m sorry.” Don handed the story to Adam. Before Adam could look at it, Don said, “I’m not myself.”

Adam put the printout down and folded his glasses beside it on his desk. “What’s on your mind?”

“It’s Mabel.” Don shook his head. “Can we close this?” he said, going toward Adam’s door.

“Sure. Sure.” Adam looked at the Room out the glass that was the fourth wall of his office. It was Thursday. Maybe it would be better to go with the roads project next weekend, when it was Adam’s turn in the weekend rotation. Don, who came on the rotation once every ten weeks, had not been part of the discussions and rewriting. A network of asterisks and arrows crisscrossed Don’s copy of the story.

“As I may have mentioned on the phone—she wants to throw her hat in for the managing-editor job,” Don began.

“Good. Good.”