Between rings, Diane could hear Evan’s belabored breathing. His whole body was vibrating from the muscular strain. Evan set the small slip of paper on the desk. There was writing on it.

Diane’s phone rang. She grabbed the receiver, interrupting its full ring.

“Diane Crayton,” she shouted into the phone.

“Hi, Diane. It’s me, Evan,” said the tinny voice in her ear.

“Evan?”

Evan kept smiling, unspeaking. He released the paper.

“I can’t make it into work today, Diane,” Evan’s voice on the phone said. “Can you tell Catharine that I can’t make it into work today?”

“Evan,” Diane repeated.

Evan stood up, breathed deeply in through his nose and deeply out through his mouth.

“I am not able to come to work today, Diane. Do you understand me?” said the voice on the phone.

“Yes. I think.”

Evan smiled again. He looked at Diane. She saw the slip of paper on her desk. She could not read what it said.

“Am I being clear, Diane?”

“Evan, I don’t know. Where are you? Where are you right now?”

“I can’t make it in today.”

Diane stared at the slip of paper on her desk. Evan looked toward Diane, smiling. Then he turned, no longer looking toward Diane, but likely still smiling. He walked quickly away from her desk, turning the corner and heading down the hall, out of sight.

“Evan. Hello?”

“Tell Catharine.”

“Click,” the phone said.

Diane hung up. She looked down at the slip of paper on her desk. It was not there.

She hurried to Catharine’s office. On the way she saw Dawn.

“Hey, Dawn. Where have you been?”

“Hi, Diane. I was home sick for a couple of days. Feeling a lot better though.”

“Good. We were missing you around here. Say, did you see Evan this morning?”

“Who?”

“Evan.”

“Who is Evan?”

“Evan McIntyre. Works in sales. Sits in that cubicle right there.”

Diane turned and pointed in the direction of Evan’s cubicle. But instead of a cubicle, there was a fern and an empty chair beneath a framed photo of a cloud. She wasn’t sure which cloud it was.

“I don’t ever remember anyone named Evan ever working here,” Dawn said.

Diane looked toward the cloud. Not at it, just short of it.

Dawn smiled. Her teeth were white. “You okay?”

The cloud did not say anything.

5

Jackie ordered coffee. Eventually coffee was given to her. These moments were related.

The Moonlite All-Nite was packed, as it always was in the morning. There were few places in town where one could quietly have breakfast in the company of so many other people also quietly having breakfast. There is nothing more lonely than an action taken quietly on your own, and nothing more comforting than doing that same quiet action in parallel with fellow humans doing the same action, everyone alone next to each other.