Barry couldn't stop sniffling, and every time he did Lisa turned around and glared at him. He dug a handkerchief out of his pants pocket and cleared his nose as quietly as he could.

He was too nervous to feel chastised. His palms were sweating from fear and his head was foggy from the cold pills he'd taken. He couldn't see very well with this ski mask on, but he stayed close behind Lisa, who glanced back often, distrusting him. Climbing the stairs, they followed Richard, a tall man with a mustache, whom Barry had met only briefly before they donned ski masks. Richard stopped at each landing to peer through the window on the fire doors, looking for a security guard. Seeing none, he continued on and opened the door to the fourth floor. Barry had expected everything to be dark, but the corridor was dimly lit and the green exit signs glowed. Plaques next to the doors indicated these were research labs. They tiptoed down the corridor, which smelled faintly of chemicals. Barry's new Keds squeaked slightly. Hearing a distant rumble, they stopped—but it was only thunder. Richard motioned them to a door and placed a key in the lock. Barry and Lisa served as lookouts while Richard cracked open the door. They filed through.

Barry was triumphant. They were in. He didn't know how in the world Richard had obtained a key, but it wasn't his place to ask. People in his department made jokes about the secretive and macabre experiments going on at the medical center, but no one really knew for sure what sort of animals underwent what sort of tests. Rabbits? Cats? Nobody was cruel enough to use chimps any more, were they? Barry had heard stories of household pets being kidnapped and sold to such labs; he had supposed they were urban legends, but you never knew. It was worth a look, anyway, and he had a chance of being a hero. He felt as though he should be wearing a silk cape and a Zorro-like mask, rather than this itchy knit thing on his head and plain white tee shirt and jeans.

It hadn't been easy convincing Lisa, a fellow graduate student, to bring him along. She and her co-conspirators wanted to keep the operation small to lessen the risk of exposure, but he had guessed at pieces of their plan, enough to make her wary. He merely used his common sense, put a few things together. He knew that Animal Cruelty Awareness Week was coming up, and that Lisa's activist group had been organizing protests outside the hospital. He also knew that Lisa was a monkey-wrencher: she had been arrested for vandalizing some equipment on Mt. Graham when a road was being built for the observatory. Suspecting she might make another bold move, he read some literature, worked up some indignant rants in her presence, and pretended he knew more about her plan than he did. It wasn't exactly blackmail: he just pestered her like a kid until she reluctantly agreed to bring him along.

The room stirred to life as they entered. Rats skittered in their cages and rabbits blinked. A dog barked; another whined. The noise was nerve-wracking. Barry hadn't expected such activity; had he thought they would all be sleeping? Richard went quickly to work with bolt cutters on the locked cages of the larger animals, while Lisa and Barry unlatched those of the rabbits and gerbils. Soon the room was a flurry of anxious animals. Several dogs were sniffing and pacing; some cats jumped to the tops of tables or shelves, others bristled and backed into a corner of their cage. Observing Richard closely as he opened the dog cages, Barry nearly stepped on a hamster. When the last lock snapped to release the black mutt inside, he started to worry.

“But the animals,” said Barry. The room was in pandemonium, and he was incredulous. What was the point? These animals might have been unhappy in the cages, but they were panicked out of them. He suddenly realized how serious this crime was, and for little apparent result.

“Split up!” hissed Lisa. She raced to one end of the corridor, Richard to the other. Barry froze in the middle. Lisa turned and waved her arm wildly, and he finally hopped to, his sneakers pounding and squeaking down the hall. They tore off their masks so they could see as they flew down the stairs. (What was the point of the masks anyway? Barry wondered. Had they been videotaped?) At the outside exit, Lisa stopped abruptly and Barry bumped into her.

Listening, she put her finger to her lips. The sirens had stopped. Would there be a battery of police cars waiting outside? Barry wondered. Lisa grabbed his mask and tossed it in a corner. Opening the door, she peeked out, then jerked her head for him to follow her.

They were at the back of the building; poor Richard would be on the side facing the busy street. Lisa walked quickly towards the parking garage. Voices behind them behind made their backs feel large and exposed, but they made it to the garage without being accosted.

“We split up again.” She looked around cautiously. “I'll go this way; you head toward the alley. If anyone questions you, just play it cool. Do not resist arrest; do not admit to anything or implicate us; do not come to my rescue if I'm stopped. We're on our own, got it?” And with that she left him.

He did as told. He could see a blue glow from the flashing lights of the police cars on the other side of the building and wondered if Richard got away. He pulled out his hanky and finally wiped his runny nose. On the other side of the garage, he entered the alley and headed toward the street. At three in the morning, he would look suspicious to any patrol car or security agent, but there was nothing to do except go home. A ferocious clap of thunder made him jump, but when he saw the sky split with a lightning bolt a few seconds later, he relaxed. He loved these monsoons, the pure streaks of lightning, the deluge of glorious water, the release of the tarry smell of creosote.

He arrived home without incident, just as the first raindrops were falling. The little guesthouse, humming with the noise of the cooler, felt a safe haven. He took off his clothes but for his shorts and sat in his desk chair, swiveling side to side. That had been a close call. And they had accomplished nothing, really, but petty vandalism. The animals would be rounded up and used for experiments as before. And the one animal he had been looking for was not there. A bust, completely.

And yet he allowed himself to grin and then break into a laugh. It had been fun. Fun! It was illegal and dangerous and stupid, and he wouldn't do something like that again, but he, Barry Bishop, had participated in guerrilla warfare, had put himself on the line for a worthy purpose and acquitted himself quite nicely. He doubted Lisa would be at all friendly toward him after this, but he didn't mind. He just wished they didn't have to be so secretive about it; he'd love to tell someone.

Now Tillie had two clients. Ellen Driver liked the idea of home hair service so well, she gave Tillie's name to a friend of hers, Mrs. Rivera. Tillie was going to decline, but evidently Mrs. Rivera had hurt her foot, and it was hard for her to get to the beauty parlor. Would Tillie do it just this once?

As soon as she walked into Mrs. Rivera's house, she was reminded of her grandmother's house. The bright white walls, the smell of coffee and cedar and something else peculiar to old people's homes—Ponds cold cream or moth balls—all evoked a nugget of her childhood, when she used to go with her dad to his mother's house on Saturdays. While he mowed the lawn, Tillie would edge and sweep up the sidewalks. Gran always had lunch ready: salami or ham sandwiches, most often, with hot peppers and briny olives on the side. Tillie loved the sharp tastes, so different from her usual peanut butter and jelly. She'd have milk, Dad and Gran a small glass of red wine. Gran was pretty deaf, so they didn't talk much, but it seemed enough just to sit in the sunny kitchen nook and share a meal. They finished off with plain cookies—biscuits, Gran called them. They were pretty tasteless but Tillie loved them nevertheless, because Dad would put a splash of coffee in her milk and she soaked the cookies until they nearly disintegrated.

Mrs. Rivera was nothing like Gran. Where her Gran was tall and thin, Mrs. Rivera was short and round. Gran had worn simple cotton dresses and only her wedding ring for adornment; Mrs. Rivera wore a bright pink jumpsuit and gold costume jewelry on her neck, wrists, fingers, and ears.

And Mrs. Rivera talked. As soon as she opened the door and had greeted Tillie, she was describing her injury, how difficult it was to get around with a cane, and how kind Ellen Driver was to recommend a hairdresser. As Tillie set down her bag of supplies, she managed to squeeze in a question about how Mrs. Rivera liked her hair done, but from then on Mrs. Rivera did all the talking. She talked about the tasteless fish and chicken in the supermarkets; she talked about teaching herself English by reading labels and billboards and watching soap operas; she talked about the recent burglaries on her street.

Absorbed in combing and snipping, lulled by Mrs. Rivera's voice, Tillie listened with half an ear. She had been glad to give up her life as a hairdresser, the long hours on her feet, the insidious chemicals, the yakking customers. But the truth was she rather missed it. She had to admit she took sensuous pleasure in putting her hands in someone else's hair; there was satisfaction in working small transformations. Women were happy when they left her chair, more confident, relaxed, and renewed.

“Angela. Call me Angela, dear. No, no, sit down, sit down, you're standing all the time.” Angela limped to the refrigerator, poured milk in a little ceramic pitcher with a rooster painted on it, and sat down. Then she put a hand—with three big gold rings on it—to her ear.

“My grandson Robert. He plays in a band. They call themselves the Bow-wows or something.” She waved her hand dismissively, but it was clear she was proud. “He lives back in the guest house. He asked me if the band could practice there twice a week—such a racket! Oh well, it makes them happy... But I told them no drugs. None of that. They're good kids. Robert, he looks so like his grandfather, tall man, sleepy eyes, mouth like a movie star. Named for him, too. My Roberto, poor man.” She launched into a tale about how they came to New York from Puerto Rico, nearly destitute, until her husband found work driving a tour bus.

“But his health. The winters were so bad there. When you're used to a sunny climate, you know? And his brother was in Tucson, so we decide to come here. We moved with two children, crossed the country on the train. Such a long trip! Roberto got a job driving the trolley. Yes, there was once a trolley here! He loved it so, and the children loved him. He'd ring the bell for them, sometimes wouldn't take their fare, told them to save it for ice cream. But it finally killed him.”

“Marriage,” Angela said, leaning forward as though to tell a secret, “will keep you sane. I know.” She wagged her finger. “After Roberto, I got married twice more. Yes, altogether, three! All happy marriages, too. They all died, God rest their souls, but all happy unions. A woman finds balance, you'll see. Marriage is an anchor.”

“True, true,” said Angela with a sigh. “Well, then, I speak for myself. A partner, then, eh? Is that what you call him?” She looked skeptical, then shrugged. “Well, everybody needs companionship. But a ring—all the better, I say. More coffee? Then let's take these curlers out, eh?”

“What do you know about dogs?” said Angela. Tillie was taken aback. “Dogs?” “Robert—my grandson Robert—he brought home a dog. I said, No dog! But he promised he'd keep it out of the garden, said it'd make a good watchdog. I don't know—I always thought watchdogs were big and scary looking. I don't think this dog could scare anybody away.”

“Little honey-colored thing. Long fur. Big bark, but not much bite, I bet. Oh, well. So long as I'm not stepping in merda out in the garden, I said okay. Robert seems to like it.”

“It's nice, eh?” Angela said, gently patting the curls, evidently pleased. “That's just fine. Here, let me pay you.” From a fat leather wallet stuffed with photos and cards she pulled out a number of bills and counted them out.

“Of course, go say hello. She's a sweet girl, isn't she? She's got that ring in her nose—it's what kids are doing. I don't understand it, do you? Pretty face like that. But otherwise I think she's smart, eh? Come back this way.” Tillie tried to discourage her from walking, but she waved her off, grabbed the cane, and led Tillie out the back door and across the bricked patio. She banged on the door of the small house until the music stopped and someone opened the door.

“My grandson Roberto.” She rolled the 'r' as she introduced the tall, dark-haired young man. “This is Tillie, Roberto. Here to see your friend.” With a wave good-bye, she limped back into the house.

Crash tossed a pile of clothes and newspapers off a brown plaid couch and invited Tillie to sit down. The room's walls were bare, save for a bulletin board that was plastered with phone numbers on bits of paper and colored flyers announcing various bands. The lampshade was torn and the carpet littered with chip bags and beer cans, piles of CD's, magazines and pizza boxes. Two Martin guitar cases leaned against the wall. As Tillie sank into the shapeless cushions, she realized that her thirty-three years were a long way from twenty-three, when she might have found such a place inviting, or at least interesting. Now she just felt intrusive. What had gotten into her? Asking to listen in, as though she were a teen-aged groupie.

.
I know this T-shirt had a pocket on it
I know I shouldn't get a bee in my bonnet
But I'm really rather flummoxed since I lost it
Doggone it
Don't tell me now it's riding on my back
.

Tillie was reminded of one summer—she must have been about eight—when she and her friends pretended they were the Beatles. They turned a hassock on its side for a drum, borrowed their brothers' cheap guitars and lip-synched to the songs—even the never-ending “Hey Jude.” Over and over they practiced, feeling so grown-up and talented. Even now something in her wanted to grab a guitar and jam—even though she couldn't play a lick. It was the lure of being purely physical, allowing your body and not simply your mind create something. It was the desire to draw others into sharing your pleasure.

Her friends and she also created a circus, complete with acrobats, a dancing bear, and a magician. They invited parents, did cartwheels, formed a human pyramid. Did they ever ask themselves whether they could do it or not? When she was even younger, she and her friend Becky would sneak around behind the playhouse and run the hose in the dirt to make a rich, mucky ooze, the perfect consistency to plop into old pie tins and decorate with leaves and twigs. Her mom used to get so mad about that, but mud was an irresistible, lovely thing. How delicious to get your hands in that gloppy stuff, the color and consistency of fudge, and to feel it squish between your fingers and toes. When she took pottery classes in high school, she had felt the same primal response, and quickly, intuitively learned to center the clay on the wheel. She had never taken a mud bath, but it must be a wonderfully sensuous experience, she thought. That's why pigs lie in wallows.

.
Tried to tie the leash up to your doggy's back end
With underwear upon my head I'm starting a new trend
I'm stirring soup with knives
But I'm not going 'round the bend
Just waiting for my lover to come home
.

They were decent musicians, Donna clearly the most accomplished. As they went on to rehearse other songs, Donna played some complicated violin parts or sang with a clear, rich voice. Walt played percussion with rice in a coffee can and wooden spoons on a block of wood; Crash played lead guitar and sang loudly, if not always in tune. They flubbed their way through theme songs to Gilligan's Island and the Patty Duke Show, singing them at double-time or with a reggae beat. They were having fun, Tillie realized. If other people liked it, all the better.

The group stopped to discuss a rough spot. Donna smiled at Tillie and rolled her eyes, making fun of herself and the band for being so serious. Smiling in return, Tillie wished that they could become friends, but told herself that Donna wouldn't have the time or interest. She was just being nice; she must have many friends already. From the next room a yellow dog ambled in, interrupting Tillie's musing. It was a scrawny little dog with a wispy tail and pointy snout.

The dog came over to Tillie and sniffed her feet, then snuffled around the pizza boxes and lay down with a sigh. Nearly overwhelmed with disappointment and embarrassment, Tillie waited for a break in their playing, then struggled up from the saggy cushions. She didn't belong there. She wasn't a musician or a groupie, or even a friend.

“Thanks for letting me sit in. It was fun.” As they bade her good-bye, Tillie gave a quick wave and headed out the door. Carrying her bag of hair-styling supplies with her, she went through the back gate, got into her car, and went home, scarcely paying attention to the route.

Before she went in the house she checked the mail. Only a couple bills and—her heart hopped—an envelope marked “Cosmo's Friends.” Hooper wasn't home, but this time she didn't wait for him to open it. At the kitchen table she read the note, which had been written on a computer.

.
I could discern clearly,
even at that early age,
the essential difference
between people who are
kind to dogs and people
who really love them.
.
—Frances P. Cobbe
The Confessions of a Lost Dog, 1867
.

She was dumbfounded. She read it over and over. What could this mean? Somebody knew something about Cosmo; much as she struggled to make sense of it, that was all she could conclude. What did they want?

When Hooper got home, she thought, they could talk this out. But then, reconsidering, she decided it would do him no good to know about this. It wasn't a ransom note or a clue to a mystery; it offered no directions or explanations. If it had been written by a crank, it was simply mean-spirited. Hooper would be upset and brood for days, and he would still have no focus for his anger and hurt, no opportunity to take action. She read the note one more time, replaced it in its envelope, and tucked it away in her underwear drawer.

Maria lay on the rug next to her dog Gula, who was old and arthritic. In the last few months Gula had taken a turn for the worse: her breathing was labored and she didn't want to budge from her soft bed. At fifteen she had already lived longer than average for Labrador retrievers, and at their last visit to the vet, the doctor had told Maria to be prepared to say good-bye. “What do you mean?” Maria asked. “Will she just give out, or will I have to put her down eventually?” The vet couldn't be sure, saying, “You'll know when it's time.”

He had greater faith in her instincts than she did. That's what people said about falling in love: You'll know when it's right. She wanted to believe that—and she had believed it, with Luis, Stuart, and Kenny—but she could trust herself no more. Nick had felt more right than anyone, and now he was gone, too.

She'd last seen him in the grocery store a couple weeks ago. Although she might have passed by before he noticed, she couldn't help but stop and gaze at his face. He wasn't exactly handsome—his scraggly beard covered a chin scarred by teenage acne—but there was something so attractive about him, a kind of grittiness, an intelligence that didn't take any shit. He was in the cereal aisle, studying a row of sugary kid stuff, and his cart was full of frozen dinners, chips, and soda. She couldn't stand it. He looked up.

She was stunned. What the hell? He turned and rolled his cart down the aisle, leaving her to grip her cart, staring numbly into space. Slowly, she pushed forward, moving up and down the aisles, aimlessly dumping bags of rice and beans, cans of corn, and then chocolate chips and cookies into her cart. She wasn't sure if she was more furious or humiliated. She looked for him in the dairy, the checkout line, and the parking lot, but he had disappeared.

She hadn't seen him since. Had he been shopping at another store all this time, and just happened into Safeway that day? Had he been avoiding their old coffee shops, their bars, their tamale vendors outside of Walgreens? He was not so cowardly; he was better than that. Or so she would have thought.

She was tired of looking for a new love. She had gone to new bars and even a few churches. She volunteered at 10K races and hiked near resorts, but she hadn't found anyone who had both a brain and a heart. Of all the men she now considered, only Hooper was interesting to her. She knew he was devoted to Tillie, though; in fact, his affection was part of what made him attractive. Maria couldn't quite understand what he saw in her. She seemed a little dull, but you never knew what drew people together. In any case, Maria wasn't the type to break up a couple; instead, she said a little prayer for their happiness. If those two could stay together, maybe there was hope for women like her.

In the middle of the night, Hooper woke up and was aware of Tillie's breathing. It was the sound of night to him, soft and rhythmic. He could see only the suggestion of her in the dim light, but his arms knew the shape they would take as he held her; his hands knew the persuasion of her skin. They shared a bed, breakfast, bodies; he knew her smells, what made her laugh, how it felt to run his hand down the curve of her back. His mind skipped over past images of her. Tillie in a big black coat, her faced upturned, mouth open to catch drifting snowflakes. Tillie wearing a deep blue cocktail dress and excited about her senior show, her hair—longer then—piled on top of her head. And Tillie running into the surf, exclaiming at the shock of the cold water.

Such indulgent thoughts nearly lulled him back to sleep; but then he blinked, resisting. He didn't want to be complacent, to take her for granted. In their first years together, his heart would skip just to throw a soft snowball at her, or hear her boots clomp on the front porch when she came home, or watch her undress for bed. He didn't want them to just get along; he wanted the happy arrogance that love can inspire, the confidence that one is capable of taking other risks as well. And he wondered if that was sliding away.

Earlier that evening, after dinner, he had turned on a baseball game in the living room and by the third inning he realized he didn't know where she was. He looked in the kitchen, the bedroom, the office, but she wasn't in the house. He finally saw her out the window in the back yard, where she was sitting without a book or anything to occupy her.

He debated whether or not to go out and see how she was doing. Maybe she wanted to be alone. Then again, maybe she was upset about something, and if that were the case, he should try to talk to her.

He stepped outside and sat down with her. “What's up?” he asked. “Nothing. I just wanted to sit outside for a while.” He nodded, uncertain whether she was irritated with him. She wasn't crying, but something about her body posture seemed guarded. He jokingly invited her to come watch baseball.

He'd gone back inside and, even though he wasn't that interested, watched the rest of the game, which went into extra innings. Tillie went to bed before him, and now, lying beside her, he started to wonder about his reaction to that little scene. He'd been angry. Not compassionate or even tolerant, but frustratingly, selfishly angry. She was just sitting outside by herself; why should he resent that? Why did it unnerve him so? Because once again, he thought, she had shut him out. Once again she had excluded him from her more intimate self. Part of him was tired of trying to draw her out or cheer her up—if indeed that's what she needed. He was tired of fishing around for information about her interior life. Didn't she trust him? If not, why were they together? Anger was perhaps not the most constructive emotion, he acknowledged, but she gave him nothing else to work with.

That's how it was with her art: silence and evasion. He knew he shouldn't take it personally, but he did. She had given up something that had been an integral part of who she was. He couldn't help but wonder: would she someday give up on him as well? In a way, he felt she already had, by ignoring his encouragement, dismissing his praise. She used to enjoy sharing her work-in-progress with him, but now he felt as though he'd lost a job. He wanted his presence to be motivating, his opinion to be valued. If he were honest with himself—and he could be, here with his own thoughts—he knew that his anger was fueled by insecurity. Even after all these years, he wrestled with the fear that she would get tired of him and realize he was a hindrance. That she would leave.

He knew how easy it was to lose your way; he knew that her self-doubts were too much like his own. On a good day, he would call himself a hard worker, a decent actor, a capable director—and yet he still thought it possible that the whole enterprise could come crashing down around him any time. His business and the theater, a jumble of stupid mistakes and misguided hopes. He would reveal his true sorry self, exposing his inadequacies. As long as he was absorbed in his work, he was confident and focused, but in the idle summer season he had time to reflect and question. She reminded him that one's balance could feel very wobbly and tenuous.

What was one to believe in? Although he would call himself an atheist, he still prayed, perhaps as a superstitious holdover from a Catholic childhood, or because some unknown part of him actually drew comfort from it. His sense of the divine was vague at best. He didn't feel a spiritual self resonate in his bones, nor could he believe that death resulted in anything more than one's taking up an embalmed space in otherwise useful soil. But here in the dim light, beside him in bed, lying on her belly and perhaps drooling slightly, perhaps dreaming, was a bright and shining soul whom he loved. He was beyond explaining why; he didn't care to. He wished she were happier, but he couldn't simply will that to happen; he couldn't perform the magic that was needed to resurrect her creative being. Much as he wanted to, he couldn't just bang on nails or haul away rubble to fix things for her.

Tillie awoke also and for a few moments she was safely snuggled in her childhood bed. Soon her mother, with coffee on her breath, would come in to give her a kiss and tell her to get up for school. She would put on the clothes laid out the night before, eat a bowl of Cocoa Krispies for breakfast, gather her coat and lunch sack. The sound of the whirring floor fan was out of place, however, and brought her back to the desert. She slowly realized that she was herself, but an adult, and that the presence next to her was Hooper.

He was quiet. Since she was asleep when he came to bed, they hadn't spooned as they usually did, her back to his belly, talking idly before making love or rolling over to sleep. The omission had made her sleep seem disjointed and rough-edged, all the more so because she had sensed his uneasiness when he came outside to see her. She had intended to talk to him later, but first she needed some time to think. He didn't understand that; his mind was so quicksilver he didn't always give her the space she needed.

She would have told him about an incident at work that had seemed insignificant but took on more weight as she mused about it. Working at her cataloguing station, she had been terribly moved by a book about Angela Grauerholz. It was full of rich, sepia-toned photographs that seemed snatched not only from a moment, but from the stuff of dreams; glimpses of scenes that evoked strange longing, portent, or spiritual calm; fragments of ordinary instants made luscious. She showed her co-workers, Susan and Maureen, one that she particularly liked: a photograph of a blurry table with two empty glasses on it, and the hint of a figure in the obscure light. Their responses were mild. “Interesting.”

That was her main heartache, she thought, even more so than an inability to paint: she was lonely. Hooper was her friend and lover and perhaps even a soul mate; but he couldn't be everything. And because she'd had good friends in the past, she knew what she was missing. There was Kim, who'd sit at the potter's wheel next to her and chat about food, men, and mothers; Andrea, who took her canoeing on the river for long lazy days; Becca, whom she trusted to look at her work and tell her kindly that it sucked; and Debbie, who shared beer and magazines as they worked on collages just for fun on Sunday afternoons. In her mind she cast about for the various friends who had come in and out of her life. Knowing they were scattered around the east coast, from Portland to New York, and even in Key West, she pulled them in close to her, as though she'd snatched them in a net, and held them. Then she let the net go. Pulling in, she was desirous; letting go, she was generous. Out and in, like the drawing of her breath or the surge of water, like waves tumbling forward and tugging back.

She thought of the waves on the wide sandy beach at Ogunquit, and now she imagined herself strolling along Marginal Way. She clambered down the bluff and out to the rocks where she and Hooper used to sit, the surf crashing at their feet. Another beach called to her, a late autumn afternoon at Kittery Point, where they watched as the sun set and the moon rose. It was a harvest moon, fat on the horizon; the sun was a molten orange. With their arms around each other—her cheek against his gray wool coat, his against her head—they each looked in a different direction. They turned one way, then the other, so they both could look at the eastern and western skies.

Beside her in bed, he didn't move. She couldn't hear him breathe. The longer she listened, the more she felt a black hole of dread sucking her in. If Cosmo could disappear like that, so could Hooper. A drunk or witless driver could mow him down any time. He could even be murdered leaving the theater some late night—it wasn't all that safe downtown. He could have a heart attack at 65, or even 45, and she might have to face another 15 or 40 years alone after that. He could have a malingering disease that slowly but inevitably deflated his essence, like a sad old balloon after a party. The scenarios that his demise could take were endless; the prospect of a life without him, however, was consistently bleak. He wouldn't be there to share breakfast, a glass of wine, a funny story. He wouldn't be there to point out a cardinal in the tree, name the desert flower, or introduce her to his new acquaintances. Only in the emptiness of the night did she have an inkling of what his absence would mean, and she felt as though she were suffocating.

He scratched his nose; she sighed in relief. Sensing that each other was awake, and in spite of the heat and the sweat immediately forming where their skin touched, they clung fast to each other, belly to belly, arms and legs entwined. Gradually they sought each other's lips for a grasping kiss, and finally, throwing off the sheet, they made love without a word. Relinquishing their hold, they lay side by side and were quickly cooled by the blowing fan. He pulled up the sheet. Now they could say goodnight, with a sense of closure that wasn't there before, but still he felt strangely unsettled. Reaching out to touch her shoulder, he was unaware of her tears slipping onto the pillow.

Rescue