Grace takes a seat in a chair, her cane perched in front of her, and shucks off her raincoat. I take it from her and hang it in the closet while Bob continues to walk around the room, lost in thought, studying the artwork on the wall and my father’s Helmscenes.

“You kept your father’s memories alive in here,” Bob says. He raises his hand to the picture’s knob. “Do you mind?”

I shake my head with a smile, and he clicks it on, the light flickering before illuminating the picture. He runs a quavering hand over the photo as if he were painting it.

“You kept your grandfather’s memories alive in here, too,” Bob says, turning to look at me. “This cottage may have been renovated, but it still has all the feel of the old fish house.”

Bob walks over and takes a seat on the couch I placed against the wall where I found the time capsule. He sighs as he sits, grabbing a cushion and placing it behind his lower back. “Your grandfather,” he starts, looking at me before looking at Evan and pointing at him with a shaking finger, “your great-grandfather was quite a character.”

My heart swells.

Bob removes his vintage-style horn-rim glasses and rubs his eyes. “He was the grand grocer of old Chicago. If you walked in and wanted something that he didn’t have, he’d get it for you,” he says. “And that wasn’t easy. Italian grandmothers wanted a certain sausage, German grandfathers wanted a different sausage, and he’d get it for them, no extra charge.”

Evan’s eyes grow wide, and he catches my attention. Like you, Mom, he mouths.

“I got to know him because my family delivered dry goods all across Chicago. Boy oh boy, could that man tell a story.” Bob laughs. “He invited me up to this cottage to fish. Took me way out on the lake, and we pulled in a haul of fresh salmon. He kept it on ice in this cottage, right next to his boat. You know the water came right up to Lakeshore Drive back then, don’t you? We could just pull the boat up here. He smoked the fish where your patio is now, and we drank beer.”

Bob stops and looks at Grace. “Just one, cupcake,” he says to her with a wink.

“Of course,” she says. “Like your martinis, right, sweetheart?” Grace says, matching his wink. “You know what men say about martinis, don’t you? One martini is all right. Two are too many, and three are not enough.”

Evan and I laugh.

“Can’t take credit for it,” Grace says. “James Thurber. One of my favorites.”

“Okay, we had a few beers, and the fish was the best I ever had.”