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asked.
    “Proud owner since eighty-six. Bought and mostly paid for.”
    I introduced myself.
    “Joey Pitts,” he said, and we shook hands. “So what can I do for you?”
    “You don’t by any chance need an extra recording engineer, do you, Joey?”
    He sized me up. “You have any studio experience?”
    I told him the name of the New York studio where I worked and, briefly, why I left.
    “Are you into any hard drugs?” he asked.
    “No,” I said.
    “Are you a douchebag?”
    I told him I wasn’t.
    He nodded. “I could actually use a little help. I got a band coming in an hour. You want, you can stick around and assist. Like an audition.”
    I called home and left a message telling Cynthia where I was. That I’d be home late.
    “Okay,” Joey said, shutting the magazine and setting it on the console. “Have a seat. Let’s talk.”
    At eleven that night, after the band left, Joey hired me on a trial basis. We negotiated a salary (that is, Joey proposed one; I agreed). We shook hands and left the studio together.
    The street was quiet except for a streetlight buzzing at the end of the block. On the curb beneath it stood an old man in torn pants and a gray hooded sweatshirt, rocking from foot to foot. Seeing us, he started to come our way.
    “And here we go,” Joey said. “You work here, you’ll be seeing a lot of this one.”
    The man asked us for a dollar. “For protecting your car,” he said.
    “Ignore him,” Joey said, “or he’ll be your friend for life.”
    I couldn’t ignore him. My father spent his professional life helping just such people. He was licensed in clinical social work and directed Hudson County Coalition, an organization that oversaw local shelters and soup kitchens and, when there were funds, did some occupation training. Back in high school I volunteered there sometimes. My interest had more to do with helping out my father than the homeless, but ever since then I’d never been able to ignore a panhandler. At least I had that check mark on the merit side of God’s scorecard.
    I reached into my pocket and pulled out two quarters. In the months and years that followed, I’d drop countless quarters into that same hopeful hand.
    The man stuffed the change into the pocket of his sweatshirt, which was several sizes too large for his small frame.
    “You seen my dog?” The man had the veiny nose of a longtime drinker and the fragile eyes of somebody who’d disappointed his share of well-meaning counselors.
    I told him I hadn’t seen any dogs. “What kind is it?”
    “Man, you know my dog.”
    “Sorry, I don’t,” I said, concluding that the dog in question probably had never romped anyplace other than this man’s imagination.
    “How about you?” he asked Joey. “You seen him?”
    “I told you a hundred times already, I haven’t seen your dog. I see him, you’ll be the first to know.”
    Through with us, the man went back to his spot beneath the streetlight and sat down on the curb. Joey and I kept walking. When we were out of earshot, Joey said, “I don’t care much for that guy, but I kinda liked his dog. Real well behaved. Last week I saw it on the side of the street, about a mile from here. Road pizza.” He shook his head. “Well, good night.”
    I got in my car and turned on the radio but didn’t drive anywhere . Joey beeped his horn as he rode past. When he was out of sight, I got out of my car again and walked to the sub shop a half block down the road. Chairs were stacked in the window, and a lone employee wearing a sauce-splattered apron was sweeping the floor, but the neon sign overhead claimed open for business. I bought a cup of coffee and a footlong Italian sub. Extra tomatoes, no hot peppers, exactly the way I liked it. When I left the shop five minutes later, the neon sign was dark.
    “I’ll keep an eye out for your dog,” I said, and handed the man his dinner.

    When I began to work at the studio, the equipment—and the other engineers—were all