The Guardians

Except this time, as I'm returning to the pile of Ben's clothes at my feet, something changes. Not in what I can see in the house, but in my peripheral vision.

Something in the room with me.

I spin around to face it. And it is a face. Mrs. McAuliffe's, her head popping up another foot where she's come halfway up the stairs.

'Phone for you,' she says.

'I'l take it up here, if that's okay.'

I start for the phone on Ben's bedside table, but Betty McAuliffe waves me over. Tugs on my pant leg until I bend down, my ear close to her lips.

'It's a girl,' she whispers.

Once Mrs. McAuliffe has started back down I pick up. Wait to hear the click of the downstairs receiver.

'Trevor?'

It's Sarah. Sounding nervous, her voice slightly higher than yesterday. The way my own voice probably sounds.

'Hey there.'

'I tried you at the Queen's,' she says. 'When you weren't there, I figured I'd see if you were at Ben's.'

'What was your next guess?'

'A bar somewhere. Maybe the back row of the Vogue. The entertainment options haven't changed much around here.'

'I can tel you that folding up Ben's underwear isn't too entertaining either.'

'Want some company?'

'Sorry?'

'I've got the afternoon off. Just wondered if you thought it might be easier with an extra pair of hands.'

She wants to see you. A distinctly external voice, not the boy's. Mine. She's been thinking of you as much as you've been thinking of her.

And then a different voice.

Ask her over, the boy says . Take her across the street. We can all have a good time.

'I'm fine. But thanks for offering,' I say.

'It was a dumb idea.'

'No. I'd like to see you, Sarah.'

'Realy?'

'What about dinner. Tomorrow?' There's a pause, and the foolishness of what I've done hits me square. 'Listen to me. It's like I'm sixteen al over again, caling you up for the first time.'

'I caled you.'

'Which I appreciate. And I'm sorry if I've made this awkward. You're probably married or have a boyfriend. I didn't even ask—'

'What time?'

'Time?'

'When do you want to come over?'

'You tel me.'

'There's a Guardians game tomorrow night. You could come by here first.'

'Sounds wonderful,' I say, because it does.

The Old London Steakhouse used to be—and likely stil is— Grimshaw's one and only so-caled fine dining restaurant. We would come here, my parents, brother and I, for special birthday dinners, squeezing ourselves into itchy dress shirts and affixing clip-on neckties for the occasion. When I find the place now and push open its door, I see that nothing has changed. Not even the lightbulbs, apparently: the place is impossibly underlit, not to create a mood (though this may have been the intention when it opened forty or so years ago), but to hide whatever crunches underfoot on the carpet.

I have to wait something close to a ful minute for my eyes to adjust to the near darkness. There is nobody to welcome me, so I must endure the muzak version of

'The Pina Colada Song' alone.

'You'l be joining your friend?' a voice eventualy asks, the low growl of a chain-smoker. And then the outline of a man in a shabby tux, backlit by a fake gaslamp.

'I guess he's already here?'

The maitre d' has stepped close enough for me to see the grey cheeks in need of a shave, the bow tie pointing nearly straight up, like a propeler snagged on the bristle of his chin.

'Your friend,' he says with a sadness that seems connected to the ancient past, the suffering of ancestors in a lost war, 'he is having a cocktail. A Manhattan.'