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meet.”
    â€œI’m not going to South Carolina, either.”
    â€œShe sounds really kind, Michael, and wise and . . . I don’t know, just . . . lovely. I mean, how incredible is it that we’d happen to call her the day before she was going to meet this man, and that he’d end up living just five hours away from where we are right now?” And that she’d just happen to be kind and wise and lovely and speak fucking fluent Spanish. “It’s like it was meant to be,” Elena said.
    â€œOr not.”
    Ignoring me, Elena turned and raised her forefinger in the air. The waitress materialized instantly at our table.
    â€œWhat can I git y’all?”
    â€œThe check please, and two coffees for the road,” Elena said, and then looked at me.
    â€œWoo, woo! The express train to New York will be departing in ten minutes. Any passengers who wish to go elsewhere will need to make other arrangements.”
    Yup, that’s what I meant to say, and that’s probably what you think you would have said if you’d been sitting in that booth instead of me. And then when Elena informed you she was going to Charleston with or without you, you think you would have told her she was on her own and left her there and gotten in your car and pointed it north, but you and I both know that’s a load of crap. No, you’d have done exactly what I did: heave a resigned sigh, turn to the waitress and say, “Milk and sugar for me, please. And a side of bacon for my dog.”
    â€œW HERE ARE WE?” I asked Elena groggily.
    â€œAbout seventy miles from Charleston. You’ve been asleep for a couple of hours.”
    From the shooting pain on the right side of my neck I hadn’t budged the entire time. And my mouth was dry—a bad sign. “Did I snore?”
    â€œNo comment.”
    Wonderful. “Did I drool?”
    â€œNot that I noticed,” she said, keeping her eyes on the road.
    I looked down and saw a damp spot the size of a tennis ball on the right side of my shirt, just below my shoulder. “Well,” I muttered, “thanks for letting me sleep.”
    A contented groan sounded from the backseat, and I belatedly remembered Izzy. He was curled up in a ball, fast asleep. “He’s been out the whole time,” Elena said.
    â€œWhat about you?” I asked. “You tired? Want me to drive?”
    â€œNah, I’m good.”
    I realized I’d been hoping she’d say that, and then I realized why: this way I could look at her. “Uh, what time are we meeting Catherine tomorrow?”
    â€œWe’re picking her up at the airport at ten and then going to George’s house. That’s his name, George Drayton.”
    â€œDid she tell you his story?”
    â€œYes. His partner was killed last July third. Ran his car off the road, straight into a fireworks stand. Fortunately they saw him coming, and no one else was hurt in the explosion.”
    â€œSo what does that have to do with us? I mean, what’s the . . .” I faltered.
    â€œThe punch line? When they pulled his body out they found bubble gum all over the lenses of his sunglasses.”
    I pictured it: the guy blowing a big bubble, being blinded, losing control of his car, kaboom. “So if it hadn’t been July third, and it hadn’t been a sunny day . . .”
    â€œYeah.” Elena shook her head. “He was just half a mile from home.”
    â€œPoor guy,” I said, thinking not of him but of his partner, standing in the kitchen chopping carrots and hearing that awful blast of sound and thinking, What the hell? And then maybe knowing in his bones, like I had, that it had something to do with him; that it had blown up his hopes and changed his life forever.
    Elena let me sit with it for a while, and then she said, “You want to tell me about her?”
    And suddenly Jess was there in the car with us, and there was room for her because