Peter rubbed at his face with his hands as if he were washing it with soap. “I’ve been with him—I was with him—so long, it’s like he’s a part of me, and now that part, gangrenous or not, has been amputated. A confession, all right? I feel amazingly revitalized with Sandy. Like I’m walking around with this stronger, stiffer hard-on. Metaphorically speaking.”

“Right.”

“But somewhere in the back of my mind, I’m waiting to go back home and show it off to Velan.”

“I suppose you’re going to have to tell him that.”

“Yes, I suppose I am. When I’m ready.”

Having unburdened himself of this confession, he relaxed back onto the love seat, looking much more like the man Desmond had known for many years now. “So tell me everything,” he said. “I want to hear all about your adventures. Don’t hold anything back. What do you think of these love seats? Too austere? Sandy picked them out. He’s great, isn’t he?”

4.

That was a predictable waste of time, Desmond thought as he was ejected from the cool lobby to the steaming sidewalk. He hadn’t really believed Peter was going to solve anything for him, but he hadn’t planned on spending quite so much time discussing the virtues of ABC Carpet and Home.

By the end of dinner the night before, Russell and his parents had settled back into their ready-aim-fire conversational style, and Desmond had felt exiled for having the audacity to try and pull them together and include himself. Even so, when they parted at the hotel’s elevators, Gloria had embraced Russell and told him she planned to visit the store when the conference broke up on Sunday afternoon. Maybe something good had come out of it.

Not, apparently, that Russell saw it that way. When they stepped out of the hotel, Russell went on the attack: “I don’t know what you said when I left the table, but whatever it was, I wish you hadn’t.”

“I didn’t say much of anything.”

“That pathetic attempt by my mother to compliment me, after thirty-five years of criticism. She likes my sideburns. Please. And then she looks toward you as if to say, ‘See, I did as you suggested and he completely rejected me.’”

“You do an amazingly good imitation of her, you know.”

“I’ve been very careful never to ask them for anything, especially praise. I make one quick trip to the bathroom and you undo all those years of work. I assume she’ll never make it to the store, but even the suggestion makes me uncomfortable. And bringing up my reading habits, to try and impress Leon. I’ve never been interested in impressing them.”

“My intentions were good, sweetheart.”

“But ultimately, Desmond, it isn’t your business.”