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liked each other. What was so wrong with that?
    â€œNo, of course that’s not what you meant,” Joe was saying, bringing Maddy back to attention as she tried, rather vainly, to picture Matt’s face in her mind’s eye. “You’re happy for me, I’m sure of that. It’s just a shame you couldn’t have been along for the ride, as it was a lot of fun. I guess you were too busy here in your safe cocoon, finding yourself a nice, safe guy to marry. Banker, right?”
    Maddy had a quick vision of her grandmother standing in the center of a huge pot as she, Maddy,lit a fire under it. “Matt is a b-banker, yes. And we’re very, very happy.”
    â€œExcept that I bought your house out from under you?”
    Now Joe stood beside her grandmother in the pot, carrots and celery floating around him, an onion in his mouth. She’d boil them into a stew. Les Ragoût de Traîtres. Traitor Stew. She might serve them over rice.
    â€œI overreacted,” she said, dismissing the lovely mental picture. “Somebody b-bought the Harris house just as we were about to make a b-bid, yes. And now I know it was you. Now I know it was Allie who tipped you off. I mean, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see her fingerprints all over this one. So, yes, I’m… marginally upset about that.”
    â€œMarginally upset.” He handed her a peanut butter sandwich on a paper plate, and she took it—why, she’d never know. “I’d hate to see you really mad, Mad. Do you want something to drink? I’ve got some cans of soda in the fridge. Sarsaparilla, your favorite.”
    Sarsaparilla. How he’d made fun of her when she’d told him about that. How she had adored him for scouring all the grocery stores around the university, until he found some for her. And then she’d kissed him, and hugged him, and they’d sort of just fallen onto the couch….
    â€œThank you, no,” she said, her molars all but stuck together with peanut butter. Then she faced facts. She needed something to drink before she choked. “I guess I’d b-better have a glass of water, if that’s all right?” Lord, was her mouth closed? Hertop lip was so huge and rubbery-feeling, she really couldn’t tell.
    She’d planned never to see Joe O’Malley again. At least not unless it was on her own terms. When he was down, downer and down. When she could lift him up again.
    Then he’d gone and made a success of himself, so that he didn’t need her at all. He’d probably made a success of himself just to spite her.
    Still, here she was, and here he was, and here the hives were, screwing up what could have been a pretty good confrontation. But how do you verbally beat up a guy, call him the bastard that he was, when you couldn’t even get your mouth to close enough to form proper-sounding B ’s?
    How could she be sitting in Joe’s kitchen— her kitchen, damn it!—choking down a peanut butter sandwich and talking as if discussing Allie’s duplicity and his arrival on the scene were no more earth-shaking than shared comments on the weather? Do you think it will rain? Hot enough for you? What are you doing back in my life, uninvited, living next door and offering me sarsaparilla soda?
    As if he could read her thoughts, and he’d had a lot of practice, Joe said, “Amazing, isn’t it, Maddy? We’ve been in this kitchen together for about five minutes, and we’re not in each other’s arms or killing each other. Who would have thunk it?”
    Sudden tears pricked at Maddy’s eyes. “Why are you here, Joe? I know what this house cost, and that’s a little much just to prove how well you’ve done, just so you could rub my nose in it, isn’t it?” That last bit came out as “sud my oze in it,” but she wasn’t about to repeat herself.
    â€œRub your nose in it? Me?” Joe,