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Ira thinks Jesse’s a failure. He says Jesse’s entire life was ruined by a single friendship, which is nonsense. All Don Burnham did was tell Jesse he had singing talent. Call that ruining a life? But you take a boy like Jesse, who doesn’t do just brilliantly in school, and whose father’s always at him about his shortcomings; and you tell him there’s this one special field where he shines—well, what do you expect? Think he’ll turn his back on that and forget it?”
    “Well, of course not!” Mabel said indignantly.
    “Of course not. He took up singing with a hard-rock band. He dropped out of high school and collected a whole following of girls and finally one particular girl and then he married her; nothing wrong with that. Brought her to live in our house because he wasn’t making much money. I was thrilled. They had a darling little baby. Then his wife and baby moved out on account of this awful scene, just up and left. It was nothing but an argument really, but you know how those can escalate. I said, ‘Ira, go after her; it’s your fault she went.’ (Ira was right in the thick of that scene and I blame him to this day.) But Ira said no, let her do what she liked. He said let them just go on and go, but I felt she had ripped that child from my flesh and left a big torn spot behind.”
    “Grandbabies,” Mabel said. “Don’t get me started.”
    Ira said, “Not to change the subject, but—”
    “Oh, Ira,” Maggie told him, “just take Highway Ten and shut up about it.”
    He gave her a long, icy stare. She buried her nose in her Kleenex, but she knew what kind of stare it was. Then he asked Mabel, “Have you ever been to Deer Lick?”
    “Deer Lick,” Mabel said. “Seems to me I’ve heard of it.”
    “I was wondering where we’d cut off from Route One to get there.”
    “Now, that I wouldn’t know,” Mabel told him. She asked Maggie, “Honey, can I pour you more coffee?”
    “Oh, no, thank you,” Maggie said. In fact, her mug was untouched. She took a little sip to show her appreciation.
    Mabel tore the bill off a pad and handed it to Ira. He paid in loose change, standing up to root through his pockets. Maggie, meanwhile, placed her damp Kleenex in the empty chip sack and made a tidy package of it so as not to be any trouble. “Well, it was nice talking to you,” she told Mabel.
    “Take care, sweetheart,” Mabel said.
    Maggie had the feeling they ought to kiss cheeks, like women who’d had lunch together.
    She wasn’t crying anymore, but she could sense Ira’s disgust as he led the way to the parking lot. It felt like a sheet of something glassy and flat, shutting her out. He ought to have married Ann Landers, she thought. She slid into the car. The seat was so hot it burned through the back of her dress. Ira got in too and slammed the door behind him. If he had married Ann Landers he’d have just the kind of hard-nosed, sensible wife he wanted. Sometimes, hearing his grunt of approval as he read one of Ann’s snappy answers, Maggie felt an actual pang of jealousy.
    They passed the ranch houses once again, jouncing along the little paved road. The map lay between them,crisply folded. She didn’t ask what he’d decided about routes. She looked out the window, every now and then sniffing as quietly as possible.
    “Six and a half years,” Ira said. “No, seven now, and you’re still dragging up that Fiona business. Telling total strangers it was all my fault she left. You just have to blame someone for it, don’t you, Maggie.”
    “If someone’s to blame, why, yes, I do,” Maggie told the scenery.
    “Never occurred to you it might be your fault, did it.”
    “Are we going to go through this whole dumb argument again?” she asked, swinging around to confront him.
    “Well, who brought it up, I’d like to know?”
    “I was merely stating the facts, Ira.”
    “Who asked for the facts, Maggie? Why do you feel the need to pour out your soul to some waitress?”
    “Now,