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blind brother-in-law closes the front door, and I return to the car.
    The house sits in the sun looking like a painting of a perfect home. I let out my breath in a long sigh, turn on the ignition,and wend my way back out of the hills, onto the highway again, pointing the nose of my car toward Wellington.
    If I could just meet them, with a hand held out, surely there would be some kind of feeling between us, a warm feeling, of family and everything that family meant? Or did they only see me as the indirect cause of their mother’s death?
    The road home is long and dull. As if in sympathy with my mood, the rain starts when I reach the Rimutakas, and I slow to a crawl behind a stream of trucks grinding their cautious way up and over the pass.
    When I reach the harbor, Wellington itself is gray, the clouds mirroring the grayness of the buildings and the gray sea. My car swishes along the motorway, through the wet streets, and up the hill to home.
    By the time I pull into the garage I have decided to let sleeping sisters lie. For now, anyway, until I work out how to get through to them. I don’t want to take the risk and hold out my hand only to see them turn away.
    I walk up the path to my father’s old home. All the anticipation and the enthusiasm I had been feeling have fizzled out in the rain.
    I wonder, again, what the hell I am doing here, following my father’s cold trail.

Chapter 9
    Dirk is a big man with sandy hair and freckled skin and Jiro is small and dark and has a Japanese cast to his features.
    Their accents are pure American. We play the game of establishing whereabouts in America we are from. Jiro and Dirk are L.A. from the top of their well-groomed heads to the pointy tips of their elegant footwear.
    â€œI grew up in Portland,” I say.
    â€œDo you get home often?” Dirk asks.
    â€œI stopped in to see my stepmother a month ago,” I say. “But I wouldn’t call Portland home.”
    â€œSo,” interjects Karim, “what movies are you guys working on?”
    â€œ
The Hobbit
,” Jiro replies.
    Bloody hobbits, can’t get away from them.
    â€œAnd where is home?” Dirk asks me.
    â€œAh. Home is where my clothes are. Last year Sydney. Right now, Wellington. Next year, who knows?”
    â€œWhat do you think of New Zealand?” asks Jiro.
    â€œDon’t you guys start! Of course I think it’s beautiful. And friendly.”
    â€œNew Zealanders are the most gay-friendly people we’ve ever met,” Jiro says. “People dislike the fact we’re American more than that we’re gay.”
    Dirk laughs. “Yeah, Kiwis think it’s okay to trash Yanks. That’s not being racist, is it! Not like saying anything negative about the Maori. You get crucified for criticizing Maori.”
    Karim frowns. “I don’t find it so racist. I am doing very well.”
    â€œNew Zealanders don’t much like people from the countries they think are doing better than they,” says Dirk. “Americans. Australians. Increasingly, the Chinese. Kiwis call it the tall-poppy syndrome. We call it small-dog syndrome.”
    â€œAlthough they wouldn’t recognize my qualifications,” says Karim.
    â€œIn America, we worship the successful and it’s the poor who are disliked—especially the Mexican poor,” says Dirk.
    â€œAnd it was hard to get a place to rent,” says Karim. “But apart from that, New Zealand has been fine.”
    â€œIt could certainly be a lot worse,” says Jiro. “The Japanese don’t like any other races at all.”
    â€œI guess everyone is a little racist, against somebody or other,” I say. “But admitting it is taboo.”
    Sally joins us. “What’s taboo? Enjoying anal sex?”
    â€œNo, no, no!” Jiro’s face flushes. “We’re talking about having racist thoughts.”
    Dirk’s eyes rest on Sally with an expression of