And she, eyes round, looked at that tilted door as well, and said she loved me.

“You want to go stay with one of your friends?”

She suggested we go for spaghetti with clam sauce on the piazza.

Before we left, I took out every screw from the two parts of the doorjamb and leaned the door against the wardrobe. It felt like the first time I’d ever really seen that door. The next morning, I called to get some workers over to hammer in new metal hinges, the same lightweight hinges that ran the full height of the door. Now, this tall door (without a mark on it) sounded different when clicked shut, because it was slightly out of alignment. That new sound won me over.

I’d never seen a woman from so close-up. Sometimes I’d recall my old lovers with a sense of heartbreak, as though only now could I feel what I hadn’t really felt in the past for these other women I’d lived with, though perhaps these feelings had been there all along.

That’s how things were during that period, and the news of my father’s money coincided with seeing Barbara, like the door, as if for the first time.

I propped my elbows on the kitchenette windowsill, waiting to catch a glimpse of him while I kept my mother company.

The sun hadn’t set, and it was that in-between weather, too cold for a T-shirt and too warm for a sweater; everything was suspended, elusive: the urge to beg for that money might vanish if I gave in to the feeling that I had to go home for dinner, that is, to the feeling that I had to disentangle myself from my present state.

After a short time standing watch, I saw him, in his raincoat, with his briefcase, coming down the sidewalk toward the entrance gate. I interrupted my mother: “I’m going out for a sec.”

I can’t find a realistic style to talk about this episode. I tried writing an actual scene, but I’m overwhelmed by how false conventional narrative feels: sentences alternating between facial expressions, gestures, a detail about the weather, the study of a tenant either exiting the building or coming home.

An important event is like a great soccer match, the confusing, incomplete commentary on the moment and what follows: observations, reenactments, instant replays, and all the talk.

The commentary on those fateful minutes:

He’s on the landing! He’s pressing the button for the elevator to go up to the third floor so his father can’t get on! He wants them to talk face-to-face! He hurtles down the stairs, his heart in his throat! His father’s there, waiting for the elevator! He comes toward him—he has to decide if he’ll kiss his father or not! His father is carrying his briefcase, he looks happy! The son blurts out: “Way to go, Dad!” The other man answers: “Yeah!” “You coming back from a meeting?” “Yeah, at the club!” “Great!”