Hey. Believe it or not, I'm not perfect.

Seriously. I just kind of grope my way along, feeling my way through life and I've developed ways of doing it that some people think are pretty amazing. I know that. It's important to give yourself credit for your strengths, or you'll be racked by doubt and self-hatred. And then you'll just be useless, not to mention miserable.

It's also important to know when things are good, and to celebrate them. So I'm just going to come out and say it: Life is better.

See, I know I've been faked out before, but it's been five months, after all. Well, just past a year since Roy dumped Casey over the phone — at my demand, I might add — and then we both turned around and let him go home in pieces. A year can pass incredibly quickly, but it's still plenty of time for a person to change their life. Really change — which is to say, I would know by now if it was all going to fall apart now. I think.

I would never let Casey know that I'm having these thoughts, although we probably all have them. The odd moment comes along when I look at him and wonder if it's all about to break wide open. And then it passes and we're all still hanging in there.

Anyway, my point was that I must be just totally fucking wrong from time to time. I mean, once in a while, just on occasion — and I know that if some people, Zeke for instance, were reading my mind right now they'd snort, or laugh, or otherwise indicate that I'm making a huge understatement here. Of course, if anyone should know about being wrong, it's Zeke, but bless his big, beautiful ego, in his mind he's wrong far less often than he actually is.

I do love him, though. When it counts, he comes through. When he goes wrong he goes spectacularly wrong, but the incredible thing is that he's somehow managed to right himself every time so far, and thank god. He performed one helluva come-about last January. I told him then I thought things were going to get better. It wasn't the first time I had said it. I think it helps to keep saying positive things, you know? Eventually, you will make them true. And hey, this time I was right.

And another thing. I'm also right about that pasta with the heavy cream sauce that Oliver just pulled from the menu for some tinkering. It was just too rich, too one note. Not up to his standards at all, and I was surprised he let it pass in the first place. He hasn't been himself the last month or so, Jerry noticed it too. The entire staff of Sojourn have noticed it.

You wouldn't think that I'd have time for this sort of rumination while working, but I do. A lot of the work of a chef is rote; the same procedures night after night, and we can be attentive to quality even while thinking of other things. It's been busy here at Sojourn, but this is just Tuesday and thus not as bad as some nights. Tonight, I will even get a ten-minute break.

Jerry comes through the left of the two swinging doors. His eyes meet mine briefly as he rattles off the next round of orders. Crap, the damned stuffed chicken breast again, and of course another rack of lamb. Sometimes I wonder why people come to a restaurant like this when they only want stuff that is like stuff they've eaten before. Ranjana, my partner in all things meat, has already gone to the fridge for the lamb and chicken.

"And we've got a Meg," Jerry concludes.

This would be our in-house term for those people, male or female who want it the way they want it, for whatever reason. Truly, it doesn't bother us. Well, not me, at least. I'd really prefer someone was happy with their meal, as opposed to their ordering something they were unsure about, choking down a few bites, and declaring it "fine". That really pisses me off. Tell me if you don't like it. I can take it.

"Okay," I say. "Hit me."

"He wants the salmon but with the bulghur pilaf instead of the risotto cake, no browned butter on the vegetables and only half the sauce."

I nod, and get to it while Jerry goes back out – the right door, not the left. Going through the wrong swinging door is the stuff of Charlie Chaplin and Three's Company, and it doesn't happen here. I start on the salmon, only to be pulled up short by Eva, one of our busgirls calling out, "Sasha! The phone's for you."

I hadn't heard it ring, no surprise.

"Who is it?" I shout. I have to, over the clatter of pans and plates and fans and food sizzling. "Your roommate, I think."

I bite my lip. Casey calls me at work only rarely, and only if it's something serious. An emergency, I guess you'd say. The last such emergency had been back in March. Something had happened at school that he hadn't wanted to tell me but called in a bit of a state; he was at home by himself and he was panicking. I think he'd really just wanted my permission to take a Xanax. Yeah, at some point Dr. Chakri allowed Xanax back into his life, with the proviso that he only take them when absolutely necessary. He really doesn't seem to need them most of the time, so if he asks for one I know it's an emergency. Of course I told him go ahead and take one. According to Dr. Yves, it's possible for a "breakout" attack to happen, just out of the blue and for no apparent reason. Real panic attacks are infrequent these days but they do happen, and then he gets really down with himself for a while, like he feels he's failed in some way. Then sometimes he'll just have a generally bad, no good day and he'll be hyperventilating a lot. We just ride it out, and somehow he finds his equilibrium again.

That is, I think the panic attacks are few and far between. He doesn't tell me everything, and that's something I'm just going to have to accept.

Ranjana says, "Go ahead, I've got it."

"You sure?"

"For a few minutes? Yeah."

My heart quickens just a little as I go take the phone. "Casey?"

"Sasha."

Okay, yes… He sounds okay.

"What's up?"

"Sasha, your sister called."

"My sister," I echo. Yeah, I have a sister, a couple of brothers too. I have been in occasional contact with Anna, basically to keep her up to date on my address and phone number but haven't spoken to anyone else in my family in twelve years.

"She said she needs you to call her, that it's — um, it's urgent."

Oh, shit. Crap. This could only be bad news, and bad news in this context could only relate to one or more of my parents or siblings. Nothing else would inspire her to contact me.

"She left a number to call," Casey continues.

"I have her number at home."

"But she wanted you to call right away. She said call her at this one."

"Um...okay, hang on." I hunt for something to write on, falling back on a piece of paper towel and the dry erase marker we used to keep track of ingredients that were running low. "Okay, shoot."

"It's 233-555-1926."

Shit again. It is familiar, etched in my brain as the first phone number one ever knows as a child usually is… I could be annoyed that Anna seems to think I'd need to be told, but mainly I am terrified.

"Okay, thanks, kitten."

"Sasha... I hope everything's okay."

"Me, too. Gotta go now." I hang up. Removing the checkered kerchief that we all wear — it's really more of cap — I rub my scalp, staring at that paper towel with the number of what was once home.

Suddenly, there is a body adjacent to mine. "What's up?" Jerry says in a low tone. He doesn't touch me. Everyone knows we are a couple, but we have agreed to keep everything as professional as possible here.

"My sister called."

"Oh."

"She wants me to call her at my parents' house. Said it's urgent."

"You can use my cell," he offers.

I shake my head. "I have work."

"Sasha."

"Whatever it is, there's nothing I can do now."

"But it's later in Wisconsin, right? And by the time you get done here it'll be the middle of the night for us, never mind them."

I love my boyfriend, but sometimes I really want to throttle him. I'm sure he can see that I just want to sear my lamb in peace, not knowing whatever it is for just a while longer. The thing with Jerry is, he comes from the perfect family. He has six brothers and sisters and two parents, all of whom completely accept him despite their being boringly traditional in every other respect. His parents go to a Catholic church every Sunday, and had their children brought up in the church, baptised, confessed, the whole deal.

So naturally, when Jerry came out to them at twenty-two, they were a bit upset. They asked him for a day or two to think it over. They talked to their priests, and each other, and then told him they still loved him and accepted him because God had made him this way and how could God do that if it was wrong? They said the church is wrong about some things and needs to work on that just like it always needs to. They said priests are often confused because they don't get to have sex — while their priest is very unusual and young and he really helped them a lot.

Jerry calls this Italian pragmatism. I call it unbelievable. I realize they have always viewed him as the perfect son — he is the youngest, the baby who lived at home until he was twenty-five — and therefore if he is gay it must be okay. It's just that not too many parental types are capable of this sort of logic.

"Okay," I concede. "Just give me a few minutes."

I go to help Ranjana get the latest batch of orders rolling, then retrieve the phone that Jerry has left in the charge of the busboy. I step out of the simmering air of the kitchen into the area behind the restaurant. The relative cool is delightful on my sweaty face, and I do wish that my only task was to enjoy it.

Maybe, if I am lucky, no one will answer. Like Jerry said, it is late.

No such luck. After just one ring, I recognize the voice of my older brother, Peter. "Hello?" he says, almost whispering.

This is not good. The whole family is there.

"Hi, Pete. It's Sasha."

And now it's really, really quiet on the other end of the line. After what must be a solid minute, he finally responds, "Sasha."

"Yeah … look, Anna phoned my place, left a message to call."

"She did, huh."

"What's going on?"

He pauses, then: "What's going on is Dad is dead." He just spits it out. No, he just says it and I would think he feels nothing except that his voice is so hoarse. Maybe he's done all his crying.

"How?" I ask, feeling stupid. I'm asking stupid questions here, really stupid.

"Cancer."

"When?"

"A few hours ago."

"Oh."

"Maybe you better talk to Anna."

Before I can say anything else, I am handed off.

"Sasha... It's Anna. I'm glad you called. You, um… your friend was a bit spacey on the phone, I wasn't sure you'd get the message."

"Casey's not spacey," I say.

"I just meant...I think I woke him up."

"Anna … Pete said Dad has cancer."

"Yeah."

"No one told me."

She doesn't answer right away. "I thought about calling you before but … well, you know."

I guess I do know at that. We've all kept away from each other, pretty much by mutual agreement. Last October I'd written her a brief letter, giving her my contact information. She'd called weeks later and we'd spoken for a few minutes before we both gave up on the conversation and told each other to "take care."

"But this must have been going on when we spoke..."

"You know Dad. Even if he knew something was wrong, he wouldn't go to the doctor. By the time he did, it was way too late. That was just over a month ago. They didn't think it was worth trying to treat him, it was in his liver..."

Her voice just gives out. I hear that she is crying when she speaks again. She says, "Will you come for the funeral?"

I am, as they say, flummoxed. Bamboozled. Discombobulated. I have not been to that place in twelve years. I was kicked out and hadn't spoken to any of them, with the exception of the occasional sentence between me and Anna, since then. I have had no reason to think they would desire my presence.

"Why should I?" I say.

"It's your father, Sasha."

"Not since I was sixteen."

She doesn't try to deny it. "I know, but Sasha … I think Mom would like you to be here."

"Has she said that?"

"No, but… I know she does. She's always wanted to make peace with you."

"I'm still a homo, Anna. If anyone is hoping that might have changed..."

"I know, I just thought you might just want a chance to see her, to talk … she's not all that healthy either, Alex — Sasha, I mean."

I try just breathing and thinking for a bit. That doesn't really work out as my mind is distressingly blank. I stall for time with, "When is the funeral?"

"Probably the day after tomorrow… at the earliest."

"I'll … get back to you. I have to see about time off from work."

"Oh...thank you," she gets out, her voice thick. "Th — " she gulps. "I'm tired."

"Get some sleep," I say, unable to be as hard as I'd like. I suspect she has hatched this reconciliation as some sort of grief-fevered version of healing for herself but that doesn't change the fact that she was always the big sister, invulnerable in a way. To hear her cry hurts me, unexpectedly.

"Okay. Bye, Alex."

"I'll call and let you know what I decide."

"Okay."

And, click, and what has been a perfectly ordinary night is blown all to shit. I have the feeling that if I'd thought of something more clever to say, this wouldn't have happened. My father would still be alive.

On my way back in I nearly collide with Jerry, who it seems had been on his way to find out the news. He hauls up short. We do an awkward thing, trying to determine if we're going out or coming in, so we stand there half in and half out, like idiots. "Well?" he asks.

I shake my head. "I need to get back to it."

"But… Sasha…"

"Later."

He pauses then places his hand flat on my chest, pushing me back outside. "What's going on?"

"Jerry, I don't want to do this now."

"Just give me a hint."

I can see his genuine anxiety that he is going to be left behind in something important, and it's not out of left field either. He knows me too well. Once when we were fighting, he complained that I'm totally repressed, which to some people might seem ridiculous. But Jerry, he understands how I was raised by a couple of seriously repressed people who never showed private emotions in public. It's not fair to him, especially when I am constantly lavishing my touchy-feelies on the world at large, including him. He knows damned well that it's not the same as being emotionally open.

"Well," I say, "It's my father."

"Yes."

"He's… passed away."

"Oh, baby," he breathes. He immediately gloms onto me, he holds me, he strokes my hair, and I feel curiously empty. I have more feelings right now about the rack of lamb that is waiting for my attention.

"My sister wants me to come out there to Wisconsin."

"Of course. We can get some time off from Oliver."

I blink, trying to follow a number of assumptions in that statement. "I'm not sure I'm going," I say.

"What? But you have to go."

"You know how it is with my family."

"But this is your father, Sasha."

I shrug. He frowns. I try again. "If I go, it will be because Anna really seems to want it. She's the only one who's kept in touch at all.

"Un-huh." Jerry is obviously taking time to regroup. He rocks back and forth on his heels, looking up at the darkened sky for a second. "Well," he concludes. "I think you should go…for you."

"I know."

"And I'm coming too."

I shake my head. "You don't have to."

He is stunned. "I don't have to?"

"I don't mean … of course you want to be there for me but it's just going to be a few days … if I go…. And they'll freak out if I show up with my boyfriend."

"Well, with all due respect… screw them."

"I don't want any battles," I plead. "I can't take that. If I go I just want to show up, do my filial duty and leave."

Jerry appears to be speechless, not that it is unexpected. "I'd like to get back to work," I say. "I'll have a word with Oliver later."

This time Jerry doesn't prevent me from getting by him.

You would think that it would be hard to focus on cooking food for people, under the circumstances. It's not. I cling to the normal, to the practiced, comforting familiarity of work. The things that I know and love. I do realize what I am doing, and I tell myself that I must remember to be more tolerant the next time Casey plays avoidance games with me. He hasn't entirely stopped that, and why should he? Avoidance has its own merits, and he's a master of it. I am merely an apprentice.

Much later, after the doors have been closed, and Oliver is sitting at the bar with the day's receipts and a glass of wine, I join him there. He has a standing invitation to the cook and wait staff, but it is understood that it's not to be a party every night. More often than not, people use the opportunity to bring up work-related issues. "Sasha," he says, nodding welcome.

I sit down next to him, but before I can open my mouth, Jerry appears. He sits on my other side, thumping down with a degree of resolve that warns me what's coming. "Hey, Oliver," he hails.

"Jerry." Our employer pushes his wine bottle towards us. "Would you boys like a glass?"

Jerry helps himself to just a splash, spinning it in the glass and watching its legs.

"Oliver," I begin.

"Thanks for catching that problem with the pasta," Oliver says, unsolicited. "You were right."

"No problem."

"I guess I've been a little distracted."

Jerry stills. This has been the subject of much speculation amongst the entire staff, not that he would go telling tales. He just wants to know.

"I suppose I should explain."

"You don't have to," I say.

"Um… It's just a family thing. It's stupid but you know what family can do to you." Oliver toys with the stem of his glass. "You could be an accomplished, sophisticated, mature adult, and then you spend ten minutes with your family and all that goes right down the drain…"

"Yeah," I say. "In fact, Oliver… I have a bit of a family problem myself."

"Oh?"

"I… I'm afraid I need to ask for a few days off. Now I know I missed a lot of time around Christmas, but you see — " My voice fails, and I am appalled. This is not supposed to happen now. I am here to make a calm, logical pitch, not break down in front of my boss. There was no warning either, it just came out of nowhere. Jerry puts a hand on my arm and squeezes gently. "My father died," I get out.

Oliver's manner changes on the spot. "Oh... Of course you can have time off. Take as long as you like… and I'm sorry."

"Yeah," I reply. "It's okay, I hadn't seen him in twelve years."

"I … see."

"I think four days will do it." Now I have tamed and contained that unexpected, ungovernable emotion; I could be talking about the weather. "The funeral, it's the day after tomorrow. I'll be back the next day."

"Oliver," Jerry says, "I need four days as well, please."

Oliver's eyebrows go up. He must also know about our relationship, but it has never been acknowledged.

"No," I mutter furiously, towards my right. "We talked about this."

"I decided I have to come with you anyway."

I twist on my bar stool, facing him, trying to block Oliver from any sort of participation in this. "Jerry, I explained..."

"Yeah, you explained. Maybe I don't buy it."

"I'm asking you – no, I'm begging you!"

His eyes drop and I wonder if this is the beginning of the end — for the third time in four months. The last big argument was mere weeks ago, and it started because he suggested I should sleep in the nude rather than wearing my usual pajamas. This devolved into a discussion of my various shortcomings in the relationship department — such as the way that I always try to keep him uninvolved in the important events in my life. "Okay," he says quietly, sliding off his stool and striding back into the kitchen.

"Um," Oliver says. "Are you sure four days is enough? Because you can take more."

"No, that'll be fine. It's awesome." I am sure that four days from now I'll want nothing more than to immerse myself in the sweet harmonies of cooking. "Thank you, Oliver."

"You're welcome. If there's anything you need…"

"Thank you."

"Good night, Sasha."

I return to the kitchen, collect my wallet and keys and step out into the back, half-wondering if Jerry will be there. Since Zeke moved out of the apartment in January I no longer have access to the Mustang for getting back and forth to work, so the practice has been for me to travel with Jerry, in his car. It has been a very congenial practice indeed. Now and then, I just go home with Jerry although I don't like to leave Casey entirely alone for so long. I know he can handle it but...well, you know how I am.

I guess I'm not good at relationships. Really. I've come to realize this about myself. I've had anonymous sex with a dozen or so men, I have hundreds of acquaintances and plenty of so-called friends. I'm so very proud of my friendship with Casey which seems to be an isolated instance... but when it comes to your garden variety romantic relationship, I'm generally a failure. I'm not entirely sure why. This thing with Jerry is the longest such relationship I've ever had, and it's still such an effort, in some ways. At least once a month it seems to be on the rocks and then some how we stumble on, probably because we're just too stubborn to let go, that we do love each other however incompatible we actually are.

He is there, leaning up against his car. He barely waits until I'm within earshot to say, "I can't believe you don't want me with you."

I can't think of a response, because he is correct. I don't want him with me when I show up in Butler Lake and I'm not entirely sure why. I just know it is a fact.

"You don't want me to meet your family," he accuses.

This use of that loaded word triggers an outburst of honesty. "No, I don't, Jerry, and you know why? Because they aren't really my family, they're just these people I used to know really well and I don't feel like getting in their face. They would just stare and judge and wonder what we were up to and there is no way to change their minds so I'd rather just avoid that. I accepted a while ago that they are never going to change."

"So why are you going then?"

"To say good-bye to my father."

"No, it can't be just that. Funerals are for the living, Sasha. You go to be with your family and try to comfort each other."

"And to say good-bye," I insist. "Maybe to the whole lot of them."

"Sasha," he says, sadly shaking his head.

"You think I'm faking, that I really want a magical reconciliation, but I don't need them, Jerry. I really don't. I've been on my own for a lot of years."

"You don't need me either, I suppose."

It is a familiar refrain, and we're right in each other's space now, inches away. My body swings and leans toward him, but we don't quite touch.

"I do need you," I tell him. "I need to know you're here, that they can't touch you or what we have, and when I get back I'll need to mourn in my own way, and...god, I would love to go to your parents' house for Sunday dinner and see a real family."

He pulls me in to his body at last, hugging me tightly to him. "You're a part of that family, too, you know," he whispers back. "They love you."

I smile against his neck, an awkward thing because I have a few inches on him. I pull back and get the kiss that I've been needing.

Okay, maybe I'm not such a disaster at this after all.

We part, although he is keeping his arms loosely around my waist. "But I still have a problem," he says.

"What?"

"I don't like the idea of you doing this all by yourself. It feels like I'd be sending Daniel into the lion's den."

"Daniel did okay, didn't he?"

"Yeah. Okay… bad example. You know what I mean."

"I can defend myself against these lions," I declare. "I'm a little rusty at it, but old instincts die hard."

"Still. You shouldn't have to do it alone." Jerry's eyes wander a bit as he thinks, and I know what he is going to say almost before he says it: "What about Casey?"

"Jerry...no."

"What do you mean,'no'? His class is done. He has the time."

"He doesn't have the money."

"I'll pay for the tickets."

"I can't ask him to do this."

"But he can totally handle it, Sasha. He's in great shape."

"Maybe not as much as you think."

"Oh, come on! I know you want to protect him forever but he's a tough customer!"

"I don't want to subject him to them."

"Sasha. If there's anyone who can handle them, it's him."

Jerry has a point there. One thing about Casey that has always awed and bewildered me is that he has absolutely no insecurity about his gayness. With all his many issues and anxieties, he has somehow managed to set aside the issue of his sexual orientation in such a way that it is completely unthreatened. When I first met him I suspected it was a case of "me thinks he doth protest too much" but over time I had to grant that it is for real. It's like at the moment that he discovered his sexuality he was already so despised and under siege that he figured he had nothing left to lose by embracing it. Others would have gone a different way, desperately trying to prove their "normalcy", but not him. It was one of the first things I admired about him. As for me, I knew I was different since almost my first conscious moment, but I hid it until I was sixteen.

"He would love it if you gave him something he could do for you," Jerry argues. "It'll be good for him."

Oh, my boyfriend is good. I can't help smiling. "I guess there's no harm in asking," I concede. It would be kinda nice to have an ally of sorts when I face the lions.

There is no possibility of staying over at Jerry's tonight, even if I could use a nice, relaxing orgasm right now. I need to talk with Casey, and I'm going to have to wake him up.

Or not. Arriving at home, I know better than to look for him in his bed, but I do expect to find him asleep on the couch as on most nights when I get home from work. He denies that there is anything wrong with his bed or that he is waiting for me, but he does seem to sleep there just fine when I'm around. I don't make a fuss about it. I know how it is when you're alone in a place and even though you know you're surrounded by millions, you get to feeling like you're the only person left alive in the world.

This time, he hasn't even been dozing. He has the TV on low, and clicks it off by the time I'm in the living room. He looks prepared for me, steady even, with solemn eyes staring up at me. I really don't know if I'm about to ask him too much or just a lot. It's been so much about routine, these last few months, and he's gotten pretty damn good at that. But what of this, travelling to Wisconsin for a funeral, facing hostile relatives —

Whoa, there, Sasha. You're getting ahead of yourself. He hasn't said he would. Maybe it would be a bad idea to uproot him now —

Oh, stop it. You're doing it again. He's not helpless, not that he ever was. But he's changed.

Please, god, let him say yes.

"Sasha?" Casey is forward, on the edge of his seat like he thinks maybe he should stand. Preemptively, I sit, while Jerry goes around the coffee table to sit on Casey's other side. "What happened?"

"Well." I clear my throat. "My father died."

Three times I've said it now. It's amazing how easy it is.

Casey's eyes get huge and he looks twitchy. People, I have noticed, are always anxious about what to say or do at these moments. Helping him, I stretch out my hand; Casey grabs it and squeezes it, looking easier already. "I'm sorry," he breathes.

"Thank you."

I just hold his hand for a second, and again, I think about how I really don't want to do this alone. "I need to ask you something, kitten."

He doesn't respond verbally, just gives me his waiting, expectant face. He's developed an entire, silent vocabulary and I'm afraid that people who don't know it — which is to say, the entire world apart from Casey's five or six close friends — find it rather odd and off-putting.

"I have to go to Wisconsin for my father's funeral. I …have to leave tomorrow morning."

"Do you want me to come with you?" he says quickly, then fades a little, looking sideways at Jerry. "But you're going, right?"

Jerry shakes his head. "No, I'm not, Case. Sasha is asking you — I'm asking you if you'll go with him. I'll pay for your plane ticket and everything, so don't worry about that."

"I … I'll need to ask Tara. But I don't see why she'd say no."

"So you'll come with me?"

Casey nods. If he's nervous about it, I can't tell. I lean forward and get him into an awkward hug — awkward because he's on the couch and I'm in my chair. "Thank you," I murmur.

When Casey sits back, Jerry reaches out and casually squeezes his shoulder. This may look distant, but it isn't. Aside from myself, and probably Stokely, no one hugs Casey these days. Not even Zeke, and for Casey to allow that squeeze with out a flinch is something of a triumph.

There was a period through January, and most of February too, when he allowed no one to touch him. I mean no one, not even me, and that nearly killed me. I can barely converse with the mailman without touching, you know? And this was Casey, the guy who used to cling to people like a second skin. But we all understood. Even Zeke understood, as much as it hurt. We understood because Casey was taking a course on campus, working downstairs a couple of hours a day, going to see Yves every morning… plus, he had started swimming, for the exercise and in lieu of other kinds of relaxation which I still don't get but it seems to work for him. He just started doing everything with a vengeance, and I couldn't have been more proud, or more worried. He did all this, went about his day, negotiated those crowds on campus while living in dread of the lightest touch and while I lived in dread of getting a call, that someone would touch him and he would freak and hurt someone. But it never happened, and I stopped trying to ask him about the details of every day — how it went in the lecture, or downstairs in the store room, or with Tara, or with Zeke, whom he sees every day. And at some point he stopped sleeping twelve hours a day and the dark circles lightened, and he even went back to hugging me. It's going to be a while before he can handle casual touching from the world at large, though.

I don't know how it all happened. I know I'm not meant to know everything. I know that Dr. Yves is a miracle-worker. I know that Casey has a growing stack of journals and these papers he calls "mood logs." I know that it's not easy and it's not over and I know that in the eyes of the rest of the world, Casey is never going to be normal… but fuck them. He's difficult and secretive, he sometimes goes completely cryptic on me, he still uses all the hot water and leaves his towels on the floor and he has the taste buds of a ten-year-old — but he's an inspiration. And he's my best friend.

Best friend. Every time I think those words, they make me feel like I'm glowing. How silly is that? But you gotta understand, I had no best friend all through school. I was labelled a fag early on and spent my time with the other "fag" in the school, a fat kid who sprouted muscles and a girl friend after he hit puberty. When I got kicked out of my home at sixteen, I went to Minneapolis; I lived with a distant aunt. I obtained a job as a line cook and blew all my money partying. I knew hundreds of people, literally, but had no friends. It was more or less the same in Cincinnati, although I have to give myself credit for maturing enough to have an ambition. I met Roy and then Casey… and the rest, as they say…

I don't know how I became this person. I have to say, I'm very glad I did. With the shit I've had in my life, it really could've gone another way. But here again, I must give credit where credit is due. My father, for all his rabid homophobia and his drinking, had a marvellous work ethic which he drilled into me and my siblings. I'm really grateful to him for that, and I'm also grateful for the quiet example of my mother. Maybe she's co-dependent and passive aggressive but it was by watching her that I learned to take care of people. And how not to take care of them, too.

"Um," Casey mumbles, breaking off my wallow in my own thoughts. I let him go, giving him my most grateful smile. "So, where in Wisconsin?" he asks.

"A little place called Butler Lake. We'll have to fly to Milwaukee then take the bus… or maybe rent a car. You have time, kitten?"

Casey shrugs. "Lots."

"That's good. I mean we won't have to worry. I have four days starting tomorrow, though, so it'll be a quick trip."

"I'm sure Oliver would — " Jerry starts, and trails away as I shake my head at him. "Okay, let's look into tickets on the computer."

Shortly, we select a flight leaving around eight in the morning, and before long I am guilty all over again of taking advantage of Jerry — a sin of which I am perfectly aware, thank you. And now my credit card has been rejected; I guess I didn't bother to get my payment in on time — and it always pisses me off how I'm supposed to do it on their schedule. It's not like I don't pay them regularly. Anyway, we have to use Jerry's card for both tickets. Of course, my boyfriend never misses a payment.

I am also feeling bad about the fact that, given this early flight, we're barely going to have time for sleep. I don't much care as I'm sure that sleep isn't in the cards for me anyway, but Casey shouldn't be missing an entire night like this. Rest is essential for him to keep healthy and to minimize his anxiety. I suppose he also needs to talk to a few people, tell them where he's going and why, and unfortunately, he's not going to get a chance to do that before leaving for the airport. He tells me it's nothing to be concerned about but I see him chewing his lip when he thinks I'm not looking, and I know he's thinking about Zeke.

Zeke is not going to like this.

I once knew this lesbian couple, Jane and Sam, who decided to break up because they felt their relationship wasn't working out. As far as I know they are still broken up. They just happen to eat at least one meal a day together, talk on the phone every day, spend holidays together and even have sex. They are joined at the hip but they are not a couple — according to them.

And so it is with Casey and Zeke, minus the sex of course. Whatever becomes of their relationship, I don't think they'll ever really separate from each other. And I see Zeke struggling every day with that possessive side of himself. Oh, he talks the talk. He acts like Casey is to do and think whatever Casey wants, but I can see that he still feels exactly the same as he ever did. He wants to spirit Casey away to a private little castle where no one else can ever touch him, or even look at him.

My poor, brilliant boy. Zeke is so in love and he doesn't know how to surrender one iota to anyone. I honestly worry that his head is going to explode one day soon. Way back in January he mouthed some noises about trying therapy but as far as I know it hasn't happened. I mean, this is Zeke we're talking about here. Why would he pay someone who is quite probably less intelligent than himself when he can just apply his own brain and figure out his own problems? It sounds arrogant and self- deluded except that it seems to work for him more often than not.

Maybe I still spend far too much time thinking about Casey and Zeke. Or maybe, just maybe, I'm trying not to think of certain things right now, and so I shrug on a preoccupation that is deeply worn — and yet still with meaning for me.

The thing is, it doesn't seem to mean anything that my father is dead. I keep turning those words over and over in my mind, investigating my feelings. If this were anyone but myself I would suspect denial but since it is me...see, I don't do denial. So I really must not care that much that he is dead. After all, I haven't seen him in twelve years and had no expectation of it. I was at peace with it. I have never hated him, that's not my style.

But I'm not entirely sure what my style is, when it comes to the funeral of one of my parents. You don't get a practice run for this one.

Jerry gives us a ride to the airport while it is still dark out; there is just a thin sliver of light on the horizon. It is very quiet in the car. Casey is half-asleep and doesn't say much of anything. Maybe Jerry thinks I have a lot on my mind but the truth is I just don't have much to say. I am dreading some sort of emotional scene in the check-in area.

When the actual moment arrives, we just stand there. I am very conscious of Casey standing by, watching us.

"Well," Jerry says, at length. "Be sure to call me when you arrive."

"Yeah."

Jerry looks to Casey, hesitating, and Casey surprises us all by suddenly dropping his backpack and throwing his arms around Jerry. Jerry makes a small sound like "oof" and then just hugs him back, smiling slightly. "Thanks, buddy," he says. "Thanks for going with him."

"No problem."

Then Casey lets go and, with a mysterious, knowing glance at me, picks up his backpack and his suitcase and moves into the line-up. I have the impression that I am being handled by him.

I lean in to give Jerry a quick kiss, not quite a peck but not a fully engaged liplock either. "I'll call."

"Every day."

"Sure — but I'm going to be back in two days, Jerry."

"I know. Call me anyway."

Nodding, and trying to move this scene along, I pick up my one bag — well, he is illegally parked, after all. He just nods back and turns away.

It takes about twenty minutes to get through check-in and security. I offer breakfast, coffee, but Casey just shakes his head, and I really don't feel like anything myself. Soon Casey and I are waiting in the boarding area, and now it is time for Casey to call Zeke. It is still quite early but Casey waited as long as was feasible, knowing that he has to do it before he gets on the plane. As it is, Zeke is not going to be happy.

"Hey..." No need for Casey to identify himself of course. They talk and text each other frequently throughout a given day. In fact, I'm not sure these cell phones get used for anything else. "Zeke...don't get mad...well...um, I'm at the airport with Sasha."

Up until this point I have not been able to hear Zeke's voice. Now he immediately begins doing most of the talking, and while I don't know what he's saying, I can tell that he is upset.

"I'm going to Sasha's hometown for a few days....in Wisconsin."

This much I make out very clearly: ...fucking Wisconsin...! An isolated little spot on the side of my head pulses with an almost-sharp pain, just momentarily; I rub it.

Casey catches my eye. "I'll be back on Saturday," he says into the phone.

Zeke, I can tell, is in full rant. Casey lets him go for a bit, then talks over him.

"His father died, Zeke. We're going to the funeral."

Suddenly, Zeke is quieter.

"I don't know...maybe three days...yes...yes...it's okay...yes...no...yes, I've got them...yes — um, Zeke? Could you ask Stokely to talk to Tara for me? Explain it to her? Thanks...I hope she doesn't fire me...I know, it's just a worry...I've never been fired — oh, yeah?" Casey giggles suddenly, low in his throat, then glances guiltily at me, like maybe giggling is the wrong thing to do now. "Yeah, he's right here." Then he is offering the phone with: "Zeke would like to talk to you."

Of course he would. I accept the phone without a word. "Hi, Zeke."

"Hi." He sounds like a person who has just woke up, a bit gruff, a bit dopey and a bit annoyed still but trying not to sound like it. "Sasha...Casey told me. I'm...sorry."

"Thanks, sweetheart."

"Are you going to be okay?"

Trust Zeke to skip the platitudes. Appreciating his candour, I reply, "Yes, I think so. Thanks."

"I didn't know you were in touch with your family."

"Um. Sort of in touch. Just my sister, and she's the one who asked me to come. I have no idea what kind of welcome I'm going to get from the rest of them."

"Hmm."

I can hear his brain working, wanting to demand why I chose to subject Casey to all this stress instead of my own boyfriend, why I had to take Casey away for three whole days. But he isn't allowed to say that because he knows that Casey is an adult who makes his own choices and handles whatever he chooses to handle — or so Zeke will be telling himself as his blood pressure shoots up and he bites down on whatever he would say if he could.

"I hope they're polite," Zeke says at last, and I hear what he's really meaning. Polite to Casey. "Don't let them give you any bullshit." Don't you let them give Casey any bullshit.

"I hear you loud and clear," I say.

"May I speak to Casey again?"

"Of course."

I pass the phone back, and eavesdrop unrepentently until they call us to board the plane. Casey and Zeke talk about nothing in particular — what Zeke will do with his day now that his exams are done and he's racked up his latest batch of "A"s, what Stokely is up to and why Tara would be wrong to get upset about Casey being away from his job for a few days. As it is, he only works a couple of hours a day. It's about all he wants to work. God, I remember the first day he went downstairs to Wellth to start that job. It was two hours on a Monday morning. He went down there shaking and was back in less than a half an hour. Disgusted at himself, he sniffled on my shoulder for a few minutes while I tried to convince him that it was okay, that maybe he was taking on too much, and then he just dragged himself back down. I heard from Stokely that he spent the entire remaining hour and a half in the store-room. He still prefers it in there, but his job rather requires him to go stock the shelves for part of the time. It's a good thing that Tara is understanding.

They are calling us for boarding. Casey says good-bye to Zeke. I'm not sure, but there might be a bit of a tremor in his voice. Or maybe I'm imagining it. He looks calm enough.

Calm enough that he finds it easy to nod off shortly after we are in the sky. I sit back — I am exhausted myself but unable to sleep — and watch him for a bit. Of late, he has allowed himself to look less like the all-American boy and more like the fey oddity that he is.

It's funny how subtle things can make such a particular difference. Like allowing his hair to grow until it is a soft mess around his face, wearing the earrings and the pendant I bought him. He goes shopping with Stokely to the Good Will and the vintage shops, and at the moment, he is wearing an ensemble that to me says "little messy Lord Fauntleroy" — buttoned down shirt and diamond-patterned sweater vest, a scarf around his neck too but it all falls apart at the waist, where the shirt sticks out and the ensemble gives way to black, ratty jeans and scuffed black army boots. He wears black quite a lot, actually. The digital camera that Zeke gave to him is dangling off his wrist — the whole of it so apparently contrived that on anyone but him it would make me laugh and snark. But this is Casey and he can get away with it because he wears it all — his clothes, his hair, his very skin — as though he has no inkling that anyone has ever thought of this stuff before, as though merely dressing himself were new to him.

I suppose he's all about experimenting, these days, and it's just thrilling as far as I'm concerned. When we took him out for his birthday back in March, he stunned us all by wearing eye makeup — just a smear of black eyeliner and a pale, almost nude-shade of slipstick that worked perfectly with the black clothes he was wearing. He looked like a male, beatnik version of Brigitte Bardot, and I thought Zeke was going to have a stroke; he looked caught between outrage and arousal, uncertain which to feel first.

I indulge for a few moments in fantasizing my family's reaction to Casey if he were to really go all out to make an impression. But I don't really want to be in anyone's face. That was what I told Jerry, right? In and out, do my duty, pay my respects, and then get home.

"What?"

I force myself to focus, to notice that Casey is blinking hard, catching me looking at him.

"Whassup?" he mumbles.

"I was just thinking how cute you look."

He actually blushes, staring out the window of the plane now.

"And," I add, "I can't believe not a single person has asked you on a date."

"Actually..." He turns back to me, he moves his head around, stretching. "Someone did."

"Who? When?"

"In the last week of class...this guy who looked at me sometimes."

"I'll bet he did look at you."

"Oh, Sasha," Casey sighs.

"What, kitten?"

"I fucked it all up as usual."

"Fucked up...how? What?"

"At school."

"Why? But you told me you did well." He took one course this past term, something about popular culture, I think. I remember seeing him reading his course packet, and he seemed entirely engrossed and happy. He never missed a class.

"I got an A, yeah, but..." Casey's voice lowers. "I never talked to anyone. I mean, not once. I sat away from the rest of them....sometimes...sometimes I couldn't even concentrate on what the professor was saying, I was so freaked out. It was awful."

"But you still went, Casey."

"I know."

"Don't beat yourself up."

He sighs, "I know."

I imagine Yves has told him the same thing. I return to the original topic: "So what about this guy who asked you out?"

"It was funny...he was kind of nervous."

Gee, I wonder why. It only adds to his charm that Casey seems to have no inkling of how he affects people. Of course, I have not allowed myself to consider the possibility that Casey might have encouraged any requests for dates. I am just not ready for it.

"He just came up and introduced himself. His name was Andrew."

"Oh, yeah?"

"I told him my name...and then he asked me if I wanted to have a coffee with him — and I freaked, Sasha. I'd been trying not to panic but then I thought I was going to hyperventilate...and then I just ran out of the room."

"Oh...poor kitten." Secretly, I am pleased, as terrible as it sounds. I am worse than a father with a virgin daughter where Casey is concerned. I know I will have to get over it but these past four months have been so peaceful.

"Poor Andrew," Casey returns. "I don't know what I said but I'm afraid it wasn't very nice."

"Yes, poor Andrew." I manufacture a wistful smile. "But why were you afraid? I mean...was it because you didn't have any interest or..." God, this is hard to ask. "Or because you did?"

Casey is quiet for a time.

"He was kind of hot," he muses, at length.

I do not like the sound of this, not at all. I turn towards him, signalling that I really want to get to business on this topic. "Have you talked to Dr. Yves about dating?"

"Um...not really." His eyes shift, back towards the window.

"Not really?"

"Sasha." Suddenly, Casey is gazing at me, all blue-eyed sincerity. "Why don't we talk about — about you ins-stead?"

It's rare for him to stammer these days. I pat his hand gently. "I'd really rather not."

He stares blindly, like I might have just cut him off at the knees.

"I like to talk about you," I say, by way of explanation. "You know that."

"But..."

"I know what you're trying to do and it's okay."

He frowns, mutters, "I'm not good at this."

"You do just fine."

"No, I don't." He meets my eyes again. "I want to be there for you...I want to... you know, help. How do I do that?"

"You're asking me?"

"You're the expert." His fingers are tapping nervously on the arms of his seat. "What would you do right now?"

"What would I do?"

"If you had a friend who you knew was upset but they refused to talk about it." He gives me a long, considering look, the one that Zeke has dubbed "the probe."

I raise my eyebrows. "You should remember...I did it to you often enough."

"And you would just keep pushing."

"Yup."

"I didn't like it."

"Well," I say, with a shrug, well aware that in my own way, I am being contrary. "I don't know what to tell you. I think you should just go with your instincts, kitten. There's no wrong thing you can say."

Casey sighs, then yawns, trying to cover his mouth.

"It doesn't help that you didn't get any sleep," I add. "Why don't you try and catch a few more zees? There'll be plenty of time later for you to comfort me."

He blinks slowly and oh-so-prettily at me, and I think if I were this Andrew I wouldn't have given up so easily. As Casey curls up in his seat and settles into a deeper sleep, I also consider the fact that I am a difficult bastard. I will have to work harder to give my friend a way to feel he is helping me. It will be good for him.

We land in Milwaukee near one, local time, having already lost two hours of our day. I have decided that I do not want to be at the mercy of others for getting around and rent a car, using Jerry's credit card. He is such a hero, that boyfriend of mine, refusing to let me leave without it.

It is a bit of a walk to pick up the car. Casey trails just behind, hauling his backpack and his one small piece of luggage. I also have just a small suitcase — this is only a three day trip, after all. It is cool but very bright today, the sky stark and devoid of clouds. I hope Casey thought to bring a jacket. Spring doesn't come early around here; even if it is almost June, it can still be fairly cool.

When we get on the road, I am somewhat surprised that I still remember how to get around. The Johansson family used to come to the big city quite often — for shopping, for entertainment, or just for a holiday. I find my way through the expressways and onto that secondary highway as though it's just been a few months.

And I'm beginning to feel scared.

This is really happening. Up until now it has seemed like some sort of mental experiment but it is now dawning on me that it is real, especially when I see the urban terrain give way to the colours of my childhood — thickly forested greens and browns, the frequent blue of water, the endless stream of transport trucks, the signs warning of moose and deer and the odd patch of snow still hunkered under a tree somewhere. I'm really going back to Butler Lake, the town where I grew up. I'm going to see the woman who gave birth to me. She will probably look different — and she will look at me as though she hates me, I'm sure. Lots of people will be looking at me that way.

God. Why did I ever agree to this?

Well, I know why. It was Anna, crying on the phone, pleading. We had been close once, and that was it. Hearing my older sister so near to falling apart...she had always seemed so strong to me before.

"Sasha," Casey says, somewhat timidly.

"Yeah, kitten."

"I can drive if you want to take a break..."

"That's okay."

"But — I need to practice, you know. For the test."

His driving test is in August, and I know from personal experience that he has become quite a proficient driver. Zeke has seen to it. They go out for practice at least once a week, and I think Zeke even lets him take the wheel now and then on the way to the movies or wherever they happen to be going. I'm amazed that Zeke is capable of giving up even that tiny degree of control. He must have scared himself pretty damned good back in January. I know he scared me.

I am not a control freak. I'm not; I just don't feel like relinquishing this task right now. I can't. If I don't have something to do, I'll lose it.

"On the way back, okay? I promise."

"Okay," he sighs. He is quiet for a bit, taking in his surroundings. "Are we going to share a room?"

"I doubt it. Um...you know that my family...well, they're not so keen about me being gay."

"I know."

"I expect everyone to be polite, mind you."

Now I don't know why I said that. I wasn't even sure who knew I was coming, especially since, I now realize, I have completely forgotten to call Anna back and tell her I have decided to come and it's too late now, might as well just show up — well, that's my line and I'm sticking to it. So it might just be one hell of a nasty surprise to the folks when I walk in. They might not even recognize me.

"Will you be okay, sleeping by yourself?" I ask.

"Of course," he says, a bit too quickly.

"You don't feel nervous, do you?"

He shakes his head. I wonder if that's the truth, or if he has just become entirely adept at hiding it. "It's beautiful here," he says, continuing to look out his window. In profile, his eyes have an interesting quality that I don't have the words for.

"Yes," I agree. I can see it now, the way a newcomer might see it. It's one of those things you don't appreciate when you're a kid, but I can see it now.

"It's nice to be somewhere with sunshine," Casey adds.

"True."

"Sasha? What's it like having brothers and sisters?"

I imagine that this question is a ploy to distract me. Once Casey stops being focused on his own crises, he can be fairly observant.

"Oh, I don't know," I sigh. "I guess it's like...living with these people who should be your enemy except they're not. They know every damn thing about you and know how to use it against you...and once in a while you suddenly find yourself liking them. But then it passes."

"I always wished I had siblings."

"What kind of siblings?"

"A big brother, mostly."

That wasn't surprising, and it certainly doesn't require comment from me. I say, "I always wished I was an only child, actually."

"Why?"

"So my parents would have to focus all their attention on me, of course. And to teachers I wouldn't be the third Johansson, after Peter and Anna. I would be a stand-alone Johansson."

"But you already are...stand alone."

"Of course...I'm just saying what I wished when I was younger. What's it really like, then?"

"What?"

"Being an only child."

"Oh, it's...weird, I suppose."

"You suppose."

"I figured other people must think I was spoiled."

I snort. "You are so not spoiled."

"But there is this way that — that everyone gives you all their attention, you know? My parents and others. It's kind of suffocating."

"Hmm." I've seen it in action, what he's talking about. I can just imagine the celebrations on the day he was born, and as it quickly became apparent that he was the most beautiful child who ever lived — and he was, Allison showed me the evidence last Christmas — the attention and love bestowed upon him must have been intense, and the removal of it, later on, devastating. And yet in a way, it was never removed entirely. Casey may have felt abandoned but he never was, not in the same way that Zeke has been. And then there's me. Shit, I keep coming back to me.

In a hurry to get away from my thoughts, I say, "So what about dating?"

Casey is looking at me oddly. "Um...we don't need to talk about that now."

"Why not? We've got nothing to do but talk."

"But you have other things on your mind...right?"

"I had other things on my mind a second ago when we were talking about our family situations."

"This is different."

"How so?"

He glances out the passenger-side window, sighs, answers, "You're not going to like it."

Well, I had to keep pressing and pushing, like always, and now I know that there is a thing, and I need to hear what it is. "You know you have to tell me now."

"Yeah."

"You know I'm never, ever going to let it go until you tell me."

"Yeah."

"So...shoot."

He sighs again, more deeply. "I don't want to upset you, Sasha."

"What could be so upsetting? We were talking about dating. I'm not keen on it, I'll admit, but — "

"I don't really want to date."

I blink a few times. "Hey. I'm all for that."

"I just want to have sex."

Okay. Colour me stunned. It takes me a few minutes of flustered breathing to get some sound together. I try for a laugh. "Oh..."

"I can't deal with any relationships, so why should I date anyone?" Casey is staring out the front windshield now, cool as a cucumber it seems. "Besides, Zeke would go nuts."

"That's true..." As if Zeke wouldn't go nuts at the prospect of Casey just having sex.

"I just want to go to a club and hook up with some people." Casey turns to me, wearing his most innocent face. "Can you help me with that, Sasha?"

"With what?"

"Yves said I should ask you if you'd go out with me one night...help me get comfortable."

I think I'm about to sputter.

"I'm a little nervous," Casey adds, by way of explanation, I imagine.

"Did you discuss all this with Yves?" I choke.

"Yes."

"And what does she say...about the whole idea?"

"She thinks it's good for me to explore."

"Really."

"Kay, what she actually said was, ‘I don't advise people how to live their lives, Casey, but if you want to know my opinion, I don't think you should necessarily limit yourself to just thinking about getting back together with Zeke.' And I thought about it and I'm really not ready for that."

"But — but — what does she think about the sex part?"

"What do you mean?"

I compel myself not to be wishy-washy, not for another second. "I mean, you are talking about going out and having anonymous sex, correct? I'm just worried you'd be hurting yourself again...because..."

"Because of what happened before?"

"Well...yeah."

Casey's voice is tight now. "You think I can't have sex without someone taking advantage of me. You think I'm just acting out and letting myself be used."

"In a word — yes."

"Maybe I want to be used."

"Oh, Casey..."

"Sasha." His voice is getting tight, even angry. "I haven't had sex in more than five months. I wouldn't be doing anything so dangerous, I would always make sure to use condoms — Yves definitely told me what was what on that point — and I was hoping you could give me some advice because I know you've done this before, when you were younger. If you don't want to help me I'll just figure it out myself."

Just as he finishes, a sign flashes by — Butler Lake, 18 miles — and for a moment I indulge in the fantasy that he made all this up to keep me occupied. But I know he hasn't. He tried not to tell me, in fact, and I made him. Aren't I pleased with myself now?

"So what you're telling me is..." I muse aloud. "It's going to happen with or without my help."

Casey nods. In profile, I see his throat working, and I know that while resolute, he is also a little bit terrified. This is one of those facets of the new Casey, the Casey-that-is-becoming-Casey. He is reckless at times, determined. He will pull stunts, launching himself into the void despite his fears, and woe to anyone who tries to get in the way. Not that he's pulled any stunts like the ones in December and January, or at least that's how it seems to me now. Maybe it was just that I was so very worried for him, every time he disappeared off my radar, it was a crisis. Nowadays, it's quite common for me to lose track of him. I'll know that he's at school or at work or doing any of the things that keep him busy most days.

Still, I really wasn't sure what to make of it that time when I woke up in the morning and he was gone. He came in just moments after I began to panic; he was damp through, and he had a camera full of pictures. Seems he'd gotten it into his head to go out in the middle of the night and take pictures of the fog.

Or there was that day in early January when he decided, like it had just come to him, that he needed to go right then to register as a part-time student. I begged him to wait for Zeke to go with him. He argued with me for a while and when he figured out I wasn't going to listen to him or him to me, he just walked out. He came back hours later, a bit shaky and wild-eyed...but he did it.

Then there was the time we went to the Seattle Art Museum to check out their Modern art collection. It had been planned ahead, and it was the four of us — Jerry, Zeke, Casey and me. Casey overheard some guy diss a photograph he liked; he turned to him and started debating on the spot. There were a few moments when that guy looked scared, like he was concerned that he was going to be attacked. I can't even remember the details of the argument. Another time when we were at the Experience Music Project, Casey just kind of took off, surprising us all into a round of Hide and Seek Casey. When we did find him, he apologized and said he had suddenly felt the need to be by himself. That was all we could get out of him.

And don't even get me started on that whole Thomas-is-my-friend business. I know I shouldn't blame Thomas because he is just a nice, bipolar man, and really very smart, but he did almost fuck up Casey's life. And of course, after the episode with the police Casey still didn't hold anything against him but happily trotted to the hospital to visit him. Zeke and I were being very, very good at that point, I'll say. Weren't we supportive, respecting Casey's choice of friend like that? We accompanied him to the hospital and sat in the waiting area with gritted teeth while Casey went to talk to the man. Zeke, the hero, even went back a second time, and he went with Casey right into Thomas' room. They met Thomas' parents, this elderly couple who flew from the Bahamas or Barbados — I can never remember which one and I know it's terrible of me but I can't bring myself to care. Now Thomas has gone home with his parents because he is broke and can't look after himself, and it is really rather sad for him. Casey does seem to have a knack for picking friends. Maybe his next new friend will be a homeless, schizophrenic transsexual.

But I digress.

The point is, Casey has a short fuse these days, really. He wants to do things his way, like a two-year-old just learning to walk. He's often impatient and pissy, he pushes himself hard and gets very upset when things don't go as well as he'd like. I keep telling him he doesn't need to take these huge gulps out of life, that it will come to him if he's patient, but he doesn't want to hear it. I truly wonder if this is the person he's going to be. I can take it, really, and I know that Zeke can. I just want Casey to be happy with it.

There is no more time for the conversation that I begged to have and now wished I had never been apart of, as we are in Butler Lake. At first glance, it's all as I remember. Well, some of the stores seem to have closed, and it all looks smaller and more run down than I recall. There seems to be some growth in tourism — a few new sporting and outdoor recreation outlet have sprung up. It does not look like one of those tidy, perfectly kept American small towns. It just looks small, and getting smaller.

"Sasha," Casey says in a small voice.

"Hmm."

"Are you mad at me?"

"What? Oh, no, kitten. Um...we'll have to put off the rest of this talk for another day, okay?" My eye is on the artifact known as Henderson's General Store. It seems to still be open for business, and I am consumed with the need to stop, to go in and see if it is as I remember. "I'm not mad, I'm just...distracted here." I pull up in front of Henderson's, turn off the engine and face Casey. "We'll talk more about this later."

"Okay." Casey is wearing a wan smile. "I know...not everything is about me."

"I asked for it. And you did a good job of keeping me occupied, that's for sure."

His smile widens, responding to my grin. "What are we doing?" he asks.

"I just want to...see this store. I used to come here all the time when I was a kid."

He nods, reaches almost automatically for his camera. While I go up to the entrance of the store, he is backing away to the other side of the street so he can get a shot of the old facade. I haven't been thinking of it this way, but it now occurs to me that this could be a kind of pilgrimage, and I'm relieved that Casey is here to record it.

Shit damn, it's exactly the same in here, right down to the configuration of the shelves, the buckets of novelty candy on the counter, the ancient Coca-cola cooler and the bells that announce my entry. And there's Mr. Henderson behind the counter. The same but older, with a thin white fringe of hair and liver spots. I wonder if he is grooming another Mr. Henderson to take his place.

"Good morning," he says, nodding.

"Good morning."

I take my time about going to the cooler, giving him a chance to look. There are two other people in the store, and they look too. They look hard, but no one says a word. They don't recognize me, although I recognize them...Sandy Kirkila and Joe Pella, two guys who worked for the railroad and spent all their time fishing...probably still doing that, or maybe they just do the fishing now. Of course, I was only sixteen when I left. I probably look quite different.

The door jingles a second time, and we all turn to look. It is Casey, of course. He just nods, doing his shy face. His difference, here in this space, in this town in fact, is like a shout, more so than mine. I look like a big city person to be sure but I don't wear my difference the way that Casey does. I know I'll give myself away as soon as I speak but he doesn't even have to do that much.

"Hey, kitten," I say. "You want something to drink?"

I can feel three sets of old-white-hetero-male eyes on me.

"No, thanks," Casey says. His eyes flicker and he backs out of the store with a slight, nervous smile at Mr. Henderson. He has the right idea, not turning his back on them.

I pull a coke — in a can, that has changed if nothing else — from the ice in the cooler and go up to pay for it. As I fish out my wallet, I can feel Mr. Henderson searching my face, perhaps wondering. "Just passing through?" he asks.

"Well, actually..."

This is ridiculous. This is a tiny town, and chances are I will see this man at the funeral.

"....actually, I'm here for Walter Johansson...for his funeral."

"Alex?" whispers Mr. Henderson.

I look up.

"I thought it was you! It's good to see you, son!" He is shaking my hand. "My gosh...geez, I can't believe you're here!"

"I can hardly believe it myself," I comment.

"Yeah, it's such a terrible thing. He was only sixty." Mr. Henderson shakes his head, clucking. "I'm sorry for your loss, son."

I am surprised, and I'm not sure why I should be since people normally say those sorts of things when someone dies. "Thank you."

But of course, now Sandy and Joe want to get in on this scene. They're at the counter, shaking my hand and expressing their condolences and they start to ask me where I live and what I do but Mr. Henderson discourages them, telling them I probably have things to do. I wish he wasn't right.

At last, I exit the store, clutching my cola. That wasn't so bad, I think. It was even, almost...nice, except for the part where they all glared at me and Casey like we were a couple of insects. Only once they realized that they knew me were they required to be friendly.

I hop in the rental car, where Casey is waiting. "Take some pictures?"

"Yeah...did they recognize you?"

"Eventually."

"How did they...how did they act?"

"Friendly." Humming a little, I start up the car again. "Okay. Well, there's no putting this off. Gotta go home."

The word doesn't actually fit, but I can't think of any others to use.

Growing up, the house I lived in was your average sort of house. It was not a picture perfect icon; it was smaller than that, a tight fit for six. I had to share a room with Jason until I was ten, when part of the basement was converted into a room for me. The furnishings did not change once in my conscious memory, but my mother took a lot of pride in keeping things clean, in looking after them. We were forbidden to eat or drink anything in the living room, and always expected to contribute to the household chores. She was equal opportunity about it, too. We all, from time to time, had to do dishes, or laundry. Or cooking — I took an interest in that by the time I was ten. By the time I was fourteen, I was frequently given the task of making supper, to my mother's specifications, of course. I remember once suggesting we have egg noodles instead of macaroni and I received such a scathing look that I never suggested anything again.

I'm wandering again.

As I was saying, the living room has always been off-limits except for special occasions, and wouldn't you know that my dad dying would turn out to be one of them? Casey and I pull up to the house as the sun is just falling, and it is full of people. Well, relatively speaking. There are five or six vehicles parked outside. I can see light in the living room and kitchen — the house is blazing with light.

I spare a look at Casey who is studying my childhood home rather intently.

"Are you going to be okay?" I blurt, feeling the sweat thicken on my skin.

Casey just gazes at me for a second; then he calmly reaches for my hand. He squeezes it and says, "I'm fine, Sasha."

"Good, because this is more people than I was expecting."

"I'm fine." And he smiles, dazzling me momentarily into forgetting my hysteria. It strikes me that I have been instrumental in helping my friend get to this point, which brings me to another point, which is that I am one righteous dude. I rock. I will go in there and remember that.

It's time to get out of this car. Casey signals it by letting go of my hand and getting out himself. He waits for me, and we walk up together, going around to the side door, the one that enters onto the kitchen. I almost knock, and then, changing my mind, I simply enter.

The howl of indignation that I have been expecting does not come to pass. I take those three steps up into my mother's kitchen, every bit of it a retracing of worn, deep grooves in my brain, and now I look to see who these people are.

My sister, Anna, and my brother Peter, look as though they have been in a huddle. Also present are my Aunt Lucy and Uncle Ernie, Mrs. Garner from next door and a child whom I don't know. It seems that there is a bustle of hospitality. Tea and coffee sets are out, and there are platters of cold cuts, sweets, the remains of a lasagna. It looks like Mrs. Garner has been washing dishes.

"Alex?" my sister half questions, half-exclaims, and a bit of hubbub from the living room that I have barely been noticing until this moment — it just dies, leaving a resounding silence throughout the entire known world. Anna crosses the kitchen and hugs me without hesitation. She is plumper than I remember. I allow myself to hug her back, needing it.

"Sasha," I correct. "Please?"

"Oh, right." Suddenly a distance has opened. She steps back, wiping her eyes. "Sorry."

I see that Peter is standing exactly where he was, staring at me. His expression is disbelief, not unlike the expression on the two people now standing in the arched opening between the kitchen and the hall. My younger brother Jason and my Uncle Ted.

"What do you want?" Uncle Ted demands. He is far from sober, no surprise. I can expect the same of Ernie and Lucy, to varying degrees.

"Uncle Ted!" Jason whispers. He steps forward. "Wow — wow, Alex." He gives me a half-hug, half-handshake, squeezing my arm. "I can't believe it."

I lock eyes with Peter who still hasn't moved or spoken.

"Get out!" Uncle Ted spits. "You don't belong here."

"I was asked," I respond.

"By who?" Ernie demands, speaking for the first time. "Who asked?"

"I called him," Anna says. She puts a hand on my arm. "I asked him to come."

Ernie hisses, "For God's sake, why? And you didn't bother to tell anyone..."

"Peter...and Anna..."

"You didn't call," Peter says to me. "You didn't tell us if you were coming..."

"He's Dad's son, too," Anna argues.

"He is not," Ted pronounces. "He is nobody's son."

Peter rounds on him. "Uncle Ted, I'm handling this."

"Okay, you know what?" I break in. "I didn't come here to be argued about, I came here to pay my respects to my father but I'll leave if this is going to be the way it goes."

Anna just blurts it out: "You brought someone."

And Aunt Lucy chimes in, "He brought his boyfriend. He brought his boyfriend, Ernie."

"Did you have to bring him with you?" Anna whispers, gesturing to Casey.

Now, up until this moment I had intended to explain and protest that Casey is only my friend but it has come about that I am seriously pissed off. I have come here in the spirit of good will, after all, and now I find out that Anna and Peter didn't even mention that I had been invited, so now I have the pleasure of watching the family boil get lanced right in front of me. And I am so very angry.

The next thing I hear is my voice, slightly shrill, claiming, "Yes, I had to bring him. Would you expect your husband not to come with you to your father's funeral?" And I nearly yank Casey forward, capturing him in my arm. I feel his muscles straining, resisting the urge to deck me and run. At least he is beyond speech, which is good for me.

"Husband," someone snarls.

"Okay, live-in boyfriend, technically, but that's beside the point. The point is, we're here for the funeral and if you don't want to put us up, we'll go find a hotel room."

"We don't have your old room anymore," says a voice.

My mother's voice.

All argument ceases, and we stare at her. I stare, because she looks absolutely tiny, haggard and frail. Exhausted too, but I'm not sure how much of it is grief and how much is the passage of twelve years.

"Oh," is all I can say. I sense Casey trembling slightly, for any number of reasons probably, not the least of which has to be the number of close stares he is receiving at this moment.

"You could sleep on the couch," my mother says, neatly ending the present melodrama. She does not acknowledge Casey other than to add, "There's two couches...both pretty comfortable."

"Oh...kay."

It feels like I'm whispering. Maybe I am, in fact. My mother is moving closer and I'm glad I have Casey as a crutch. This is a good thing. Not collapsing in a faint in front of hostile relatives is a good thing.

"Are you hungry?" Anna asks suddenly. "Um...Casey? Can I get you anything?"

"Doris, just wait a minute!" exclaims Uncle Ernie. "Just wait a minute, I'm not going to have my brother's memory defiled by him — "

"This is my house," my mother says, and that is all. The conversation is over...for now.

She stares at Ernie until he begins to mutter and shift his weight, at which point Aunt Lucy says maybe it's time to go, and within five minutes they plus Uncle Ted, Mrs. Garner, the cousin I have never met and a few guests who have been hiding in the living room, have cleared out. During this process, Casey takes it upon himself to say, "I would love some tea," and he even chooses a chair and sits at the table. Anna occupies herself with playing host to him, getting him a clean plate and utensils, putting on the kettle. Jason is eyeing Casey the whole time, I notice, while Peter seems more interested in staring at me accusingly. I slide into a chair myself, feeling my shoulders slump. I watch Casey take a bite of lasagna. His hand is trembling and he is entirely focused on his food but other than that he is doing amazingly well. Much better than me, in fact.

"Can I have a plate too?" I request.

Anna gets it for me. I am not hungry, but I ladle on the food anyway.

"Would you like coffee?" Anna inquires.

"Tea is fine."

Jason snorts. I see that he has taken one of the two remaining chairs. "Well," he observes. "This is incredibly awkward."

Now here's a guy who was eight years old when I left, and I have absolutely no idea who he is. "Good point," I agree. "So Jason...what are you up to these days?"

He shrugs. "School."

"Oh, yeah?"

He nods, still attempting to study Casey without seeming like that is what he is doing.

"What are you taking?"

"Engineering."

I see Casey finally glance up, so I say, "Casey was in physics for two years."

Jason looks — and this is putting this charitably — skeptical. "Really."

Casey nods. "I'm changing my major, though."

"To what?"

"Film."

Jason nods, like this makes much better sense. Casey suddenly gets up — well, perhaps not too suddenly, but the movement alarms me.

"Excuse me...where's the bathroom?"

"Just down the hall," Jason replies.

Casey vanishes, with the sound of soft steps and a door closing, and God help me, I begin to spin a terrible fantasy where he panics and I have to go talk him out. In this fantasy, my family sees me doing what I do best and realize how I have grown, what an impressive person I am. We forget discomfort for a while, all of us, because the anxiety is concentrated and performed by Casey.

I am terrible, aren't I?

"He's your boyfriend?" Peter whispers to me.

"Yes," I insist, wanting even as I do to come clean. I told Jerry I didn't want to be in anyone's face and then it was almost the first thing I did. They pressed and I pressed back — exactly what I shouldn't have done. Perfect. I consider telling them the truth, but the problem is, then they will know that I lied. Any chances of credibility will be shot, and they probably won't believe me anyway.

I hear the bathroom door open. Unclenching a muscle or two, I sigh, "Tell me about Dad."

Peter's mouth thins and lengthens. "What do you want to know?"

"Everything."

Peter, as always playing the role of head sibling and parental advocate, responds, "He was diagnosed in early March and they said six months but he just deteriorated very quickly. I think he knew before they told him."

"Was he at home?"

"At first," Anna interjects from over by the sink. "The last two weeks...in hospice."

I can't not look at my mother. She is sitting on the stool that she has always kept in the kitchen, the one that she has always sat on when peeling potatoes or just watching us eat, talk, squabble — like she's doing now, basically. I want her to speak, to give me some indication of what she's feeling, but she's never been one to do that, neither in her kitchen nor in a group. I used to work hard at being her son. I would seek opportunities to talk to her, do work for her because she was always so busy taking care of us and, I figured, a very lonely person in some fundamental way.

"Was he in pain?" I ask, my throat aching. I realize that this has been a major worry of mine even though I haven't allowed myself to think it until this moment. I see Jason tearing up, and the lack of response from either Anna or Peter tells me what I don't want to hear.

"Some," Peter finally answers. "But for the last several days they had him on really powerful drugs...so he didn't feel anything. He was unconscious."

"Was — was he scared?"

Jason is full-out crying now, making soft noises. Anna glides over and squeezes his shoulder. I suppose they all break down from time to time and now it is his turn. I can't, not yet.

"Not by the end," Peter says, very soft.

"That's...that's something, I guess." I again look at Mom, who is not speaking or moving. I have no idea how she is feeling right now. I get out of the chair, putting myself closer to her, looking for some indication that she would like to me to touch her, to comfort her, to do something. In my other life, my real life, I wouldn't need that sign of welcome. I would just blast on by any reserve and do what was necessary. "Mom?"

I whisper.

She looks up at me. I really don't know what I want to say; I have no idea what is going to emerge from my mouth. Everything is unsettled and wrong and I can't even trust myself.

"I wish I could have been here," is what I do say, entirely unexpectedly.

It is all too silent in the kitchen, as we wait for a word from her.

"I wish you could have been here too," she says, and I am just about to sob with relief when she adds, "but you couldn't."

"Mom — "

"You know how your father felt about your — choices."

I am too gutted to protest.

It is Anna who speaks up. "But he was dying, Mom. I think...Alex has a right to be here, just like the rest of us."

"Yes, he has a right to be here," my mother replies wearily. "It doesn't matter to Walt now."

Sincerely, at this point I want to run out of the house, out of this fucking town and never come back but I am here and I am not going to miss my father's funeral now. Jerry got that right — if nothing else, I need to be there for my own sake. I'm not letting them drive me away.

"What about you?" I demand. "What about you, does it matter to you?"

"Alex." My mother shakes her head.

"My name is Sasha. It's been Sasha for a long time."

"It isn't the name we gave you."

"It's a version of it. I'm still your son, whether you give a damn or not!"

I hear the sound of flesh slapping the table and Peter nearly shouts. "Don't talk to her like that!"

I say, without turning, "I'd just like to know if she wants me here or not. That's all."

"And you have to put this on her right now— "

"Yes, dammit, because if she doesn't I'll go find somewhere else to sleep. I'm not going to skip the funeral, I am going to be there one way or another. I just want to know where I stand in this house, and yes, I want to know now."

"Now that sounds like the old Alex I remember," Peter claims. "I want, I want, I want — "

"It's Sasha, dammit!"

"No cursing in my house," my mother croaks, silencing us both. "You know that."

I close my eyes for a second. Yes, that always was the rule, I can respect that. "I'm sorry."

The kettle whistles. Jason starts visibly.

When I can look again, my mother is studying me, curiously almost. "I would like you to stay," she says, shifting off the stool. "And now I'm going to sleep. I'm tired."

"Yes," I whisper. "Of course. Thank — "

I break off, because she is already leaving the kitchen. From where I am standing, when I turn to follow her with my eyes I can see all the way down the hall and that's when I notice that Casey is sitting in it, halfway along with his back to the wall, his knees tucked up. Mom stops to stare down at him. "Make yourself at home," she says flatly, then resumes her trek to her bedroom, shutting the door behind her.

I hurry to Casey, whom I had completely forgotten. I squat down in front of him. "What are you doing, kitten?"

To my relief, he looks at me. "I didn't know where to go," he says in a small voice.

I fear I have made a mistake in bringing him here. It is the last thing he needs, but here's the problem: I need him. I need to have him here now, to protect and to worry about. I need to take care of him right now like I need water and air.

"Here, grab my hands." I pull him to his feet, tug him down the hall to the kitchen. "You were eating, weren't you?" I prompt, reminding him as I steer him towards the table.

"Yeah."

Anna's instincts are not unlike mine; she picks up the beat right away. "And I was making tea for you, I forgot! Here sit down." She pours the still-steaming water into the teapot that has been standing by all this time, and delivers it to the table. Cup and saucer, sugar and milk follow soon after while Casey just looks dazed.

I sit, and I try to get a read on these people, my siblings. Anna is making herself busy, probably relieved that I have a nominal thumbs-up. Peter stands apart like the uptight bastard he is, watching Casey disapprovingly. Jason is red-eyed but under control, and he too is looking at Casey. He doesn't strike me as hostile, especially.

Anna finally sits, leaving Peter to scowl unhappily at a distance. "I'm sorry," she says to me, very quietly. "This is actually the first time it's been just us...in days. Uncle Ted and Uncle Ernie and Aunt Lucy have been here the whole time — and I know they mean well but Uncle Ernie keeps going on about how old and scared he feels — "

"Fuck, yeah," Jason interjects.

"Shh!" Peter critiques, instantly.

"I'm sure she doesn't hear me. If I have to hear him say ‘I'm feeling like death is stalking me' just one more time..." Jason breaks off and scrubs his face and scalp, rubbing his eyes. "So. Anyway. What have you been doing...Sasha?"

I think I could get to like this guy a lot, my kid brother.

"He cooks," Anna says.

"He's a chef," Casey corrects. "In a famous restaurant."

"Really?"

Jason does sound like he wants to know. "Well." I squirm. "In some circles, maybe."

"How do you get to be that?"

Since he seems truly interested, I answer. "I went to chef school and I had to work a certain number of hours in a restaurant which I've pretty much been doing non- stop since..." I trail off. I'd much rather watch Casey stuff his face with lasagna. It is relaxing, comforting. It means everything is still okay.

"I remember you used to cook for us sometimes," Jason says.

"Yeah. There wasn't much room for creativity, though."

"What do you mean by that?" Peter demands.

"Pete!" Anna protests.

"I just mean," I return, "that this is Mom's kitchen, not mine."

"And I suppose her cooking wasn't fancy enough for you."

"Her cooking is great. Suppose you just spit out the real issue so we can get it dealt with before tomorrow."

He walks closer to the table so he can lower his voice. "What gives you the right to be here?"

"My father — "

"I asked him," Anna says.

"Yeah, without consulting with anyone first."

"Would that have made it easier?"

"Yes."

"Okay, then I'm sorry. But I think Mom wants him here. She was just too proud to say it."

"She hardly knows what she wants. This is about you, Anna, not Mom."

I tend to agree, but I am keeping my mouth shut. But Anna seems stumped for the moment. She stares at the table, her throat working.

"You know what?"

Casey is speaking. I stare, stunned by his presence all of a sudden; stunned to see and hear him when I have just been talking to my brother and sister. These two things don't belong together, and I can only let this unfold.

"I don't get how you can say all these things to Sasha." Casey sounds angry — furious, even. He has that slightly wild, reckless energy about him. "He was the one who was kicked out and he didn't have to come here! He wanted to — that should be enough for you!"

"Hey — " Anna begins.

"No!" Casey is trembling now. "Sasha doesn't deserve this. I don't have brothers or sisters but if I did I think I would just be glad — " He is stalling now, becoming aware of himself. He finishes as though it were in some way a failure even though it's not, "I would just be glad he's here now."

I could cry, although I'm not sure exactly why.

"He's right," Jason says. His mouth trembles as he looks at me. "I'm glad you're here...Sasha. I don't give a damn about anyone else."

I'm really getting close to a full breakdown here. "Oh, shit," I say, fighting it. It's been one hell of a long day already. I strangle on, "Thank you."

"I'm glad you're here too," Anna says, tossing a glare Peter's way. "Even if it feels weird. I wish it wasn't Dad's funeral that brought us together here but...anyway."

Peter has nothing to say, but I'm sure he'll find his words again before I leave.

It turns out that Anna and her family are staying at the Travelodge upon the Interstate, as are Peter's wife and kids. I knew that they are both married and might have wondered that the spouses and children are not around tonight if I hadn't been in such a state of distraction. In fact, when I learn these details my only thought is how these people are already at an advanced stage in this experience, while I am way, way behind. They're done the hospice, the initial bouts of tears, the subsequent bouts of tears, the endless reception of condolences. They are weary and hoping for some rest tonight. Peter has made all the funeral arrangements and already initiated legal processes on Mom's behalf. There is nothing in any of his actions that are not entirely selfless, I know that, but something about it grates on me nonetheless.

Not surprisingly, Jason is sleeping here at Mom's house tonight, using the bedroom in the basement that is still his for the summers, the one that used to be mine. Peter is sleeping in the extra bedroom upstairs. The third bedroom has been, at some point, converted into a sitting/knitting room. It has a small, second TV, and I can envision my two parents here on an ordinary night not so very long ago, each in their separate spaces, watching their separate televisions.

Shortly, Anna departs for the hotel, giving me a peck on the cheek and a hard hug first. Casey and I fetch our bags and settle in the living room while Peter disappears somewhere and Jason goes out — for "air", he says. I suspect that he is another silly boy who thinks it is cool to smoke.

Draping myself on the couch, I turn on the TV, needing that glaze that only mindless entertainment can provide. At length, I unexpectedly feel something warm and wriggly, and I realize that Casey is snuggling with me. I hug him back with all my strength.

"Are you okay?" I ask.

"Yes. Stop asking."

"I'm just — "

"How are you?" he demands.

Tears threaten to make a getaway, but I get them back in their prison. I just don't feel safe, not when Peter could suddenly appear. Or my mother. I don't feel ready to let either of them see me being vulnerable. "I'm fine, kitten."

He says nothing.

"All right, then, I'm managing. How about that?"

"I wish I could do something."

"You're doing plenty. Hey, you rose to my defense a little while ago. You didn't have to do that."

"Yeah, I did." Casey straightens up so he can catch my eye. He murmurs, "Sasha...why did you tell them I'm your boyfriend?"

"I'm very sorry about that," I mumble.

Casey regards me solemnly. "If you think I'm going to kiss you, forget it."

At this, I can laugh. "I feel the same way, kitten."

"But why did you do it?"

"I was pissed," I admit. "I wanted to say something outrageous. Now they all think I'm a child molester so I'm happy."

He gives me a mock punch in the ribs. "I'm not a child," he scowls.

"Yeah, but you sure look like one."

"I do not."

"The point is, you're too young for me."

"You're not too old for me," Casey teases. "I mean, if you weren't you." Hearing himself, he reddens, but I know exactly what he means. It would be utterly creepy between us. God, I can't even think of it without cringing.

"Do you think, er..." I stumble, "Do you think would it be okay if we didn't tell them the truth? It's bad enough I'm a fag, I don't want to be a liar too."

"What...do we have to do?"

"Nothing. Absolutely nothing."

He nods. "Okay." Bouncing up, he says, "I'm going to go sit in the car and talk to Zeke."

I have to dig the keys out of my pocket. "Here you go."

I take advantage of the lull and change into my pajamas, brush my teeth. I think I am supposed to call Jerry but I am so tired I can barely think. Peter comes up from the basement and goes without a word into the bedroom that was formerly and now once again is his — and I am relieved for both our sakes that we don't have to encounter each other. Alone time must be a precious commodity in this house right now.

Lying flat on the couch, I flip channels for a bit. Nothing grabs me, so I just leave it on a channel out of Milwaukee that was once one of the only three that we had in Butler Lake. It's a re-run of Seinfeld, and even though it is impossible, this all feels utterly familiar, utterly comforting and utterly strange. I do not quite watch, half- listening while I study the objects in the room, trying to put this all in context.

It is my intention to stay awake until Casey gets in, even if he and Zeke are at it for hours — not out of the realm of possibility with the way of the two of them can go on, you'd think they were a couple of teenage cheerleaders — but I can't do it. My eyes are too heavy, I haven't slept in forty-eight hours and the desire to escape into sleep is too strong. I leave the TV on, finding the drone soothing.

I don't sleep well, though, opening my eyes once when Casey takes the remote from me and switches off the box... and again, much later, I think, to the sound of the toilet flushing. I check that Casey is lying on the couch across from me before closing my eyes and sleeping again. I dream that I am at the hospital and I keep trying to get to my father's room but I can't find it.

Abruptly, I wake to the daylight slicing my mother's white sheers, to a guilty jolt of awareness that I completely neglected to call Jerry last night. I sit up quickly, noticing that Casey is no longer on the couch adjacent to mine — but I find him in the kitchen. I have to stare for a minute, as he is sitting smack in the middle of the childhood memory I never had: Here he is at the table in his pajamas, his hair mussed, eating a bowl of cereal and talking to Jason about his roommates in college. They seem to be competing to find the anecdote of the most extreme engineering student, chatting like they are old friends just about.

Off to one side, Peter is wearing his black suit and drinking coffee, while Mom is similarly dressed for the funeral and seated on her stool. She nods at me. "Good morning."

"Morning."

Somehow it feels acceptable for me to go to the cupboard and help myself to a mug. I pour the last of the coffee pot into it. I expect it to taste awful and it does — weak as coffee-scented water, the way my mother has always drunk it, and burnt as well. I control my face, having the feeling that everyone in the room is looking at me.

"What time are we due at the funeral home?" I ask.

"In one hour," replies Peter, completely neutral with me. "I'm about to go pick up Helen and the kids. Anna will be here in a bit to pick up Mom. I don't know if there'll be room..."

"We'll take our car," I assure him — as though I really wanted to be at his mercy, crammed in his vehicle with his wife and kids.

"I'll go with Sasha," Jason pipes up.

"Um...does anyone need the bathroom?"

"Go ahead," my mother says.

I am aware that the clock is ticking. Still, once shaved and and coiffed and dressed in my suit — a possibly inappropriate dark maroon, but it's all I have — I borrow Casey's cell and go outside to use it. I must trust that Casey is getting ready to go; the days are long past when I had to constantly cajole him to do things like eat and get dressed. And speak.

Jerry answers my call almost immediately, with a hopeful tinge to his voice. "Hello?"

"It's me."

"Thank God! You didn't call last night."

"I'm all right."

"I know, Casey asked Zeke to call me. Why didn't you call?"

"I was just too wiped, babe. I'm sorry."

"It's okay... How's it going?"

"Well enough, I guess..." I trail away as Peter steps out.

"Yes?" Jerry is saying.

"Just...um..." With a glance at me and my suit, Peter walks on to his vehicle. I wait until he is in, and with the door shut. "Sorry, that was my brother walking by. Now I can talk. It was a bit bumpy when we arrived. My drunken uncles made a stink and Anna wasn't exactly championing me — but finally my mum spoke up and said she wanted me to stay."

"Oh. That's good."

I keep my eye on Peter in his SUV, backing out of the driveway. It boggles; he is neatly sealed in a world that is as comfortable to him as it is foreign to me. "She hasn't said much else," I mention.

"Give her time, Sasha."

"I am...but you don't know her. She's never been the type to share." Something twists, small and deep in my gut. I stomp on it. Hard.

"Well...how are you feeling about everything otherwise?"

"I dunno. Weird."

"That's to be expected."

"Yeah. Look, um.... Jerry, I have to go. I'm due at the funeral home in less than half an hour."

"Oh. Well, can you call me this afternoon before work?"

"I'll try."

"Love you."

"Love you too."

Even as I am saying this, the door squeaks and rattles. Casey comes out, dressed all in black and lacking only the accessory of his camera. It is has been left in the car, I guess. Jason is just behind him in black slacks and a black knit shirt. Behind them, there is my mother.

"Gotta go," I say. "Bye."

"Bye," Jerry says from Seattle. "Hang in there — "

"Mom, we could give you a ride," I offer, thumbing off the phone. "There's lots of room."

She casts a disapproving eye at Casey, who has managed somehow to make his black clothing look like the fashion statement it is rather than a gesture of respect. And for the first time I notice that he's wearing a bit of eyeliner today. This must be his idea of getting dressed up...or maybe his idea of how to help me although I can't quite see the reasoning? Or, in Casey-logic, a way of taking the heat off me and putting it on him? What he doesn't realize or remember is that everyone will be judging me by him. Or maybe that was his point...anyway, a part of me wants to cheer and a part of me wants to smack him.

"No," Mom says, frowning slightly. "Anna will wonder..."

"We'll just wait for her then."

"You don't have to."

"It's okay." I am not about to contribute to Peter's list of the crimes of one Alex Johansson by leaving our mother unattended right now.

In any case, Anna pulls into the driveway just moments later. Well, technically her husband does. Their SUV — god, I think it might even be the same model as Peter's, the only thing different is the colour — is filled with strangers. I seem to recall that she has three children. I am expecting Mom to just climb in but Anna and her husband both get out and walk over to us. He is tall and grey, with a serious expression.

"Sasha," Anna says. "This is Greg, my husband."

He smiles a bit as he shakes my hand. He seems friendly enough.

"Nice to meet you." I nod towards Casey, coax him forward with a hand. "This is my friend, Casey Connor."

"Hi." Greg doesn't even twitch. Anna must have prepared him in advance. He greets Casey as though they were business colleagues.

"Hi," Casey says. When he moves, I think for a second that he is wearing mascara too...just for a second. But he's not.

"Okay," Greg says then, a bit on the bright side. "Shall we?"

In the front seat of the car, I notice Casey staring longingly at his camera which lies on the console in between us. I begin to sweat, and I think for a moment that I'm going to freak out. I have a vision of him pointing those shameless eyes of his through his camera lens, snapping pictures of my father lying in his casket while my family sobs and hates. He would do it too.

For those seconds, I am ready to explode. Then I put the key in the ignition.

Moments later, Casey is just my friend again, an ordinary and comforting presence, and I have that shameful sweat drying on my skin. I've barely been in this frickin' place for twelve hours and look what they're doing to me. Of course Casey or my family's reactions to him or to me, those really aren't my main problem, because now I realize that I have not given a moment's thought to what is going to happen to me when I see my father's body. That is my main problem.

Just drive, Sasha. Turn that wheel, gas, brake, gas, brake. Behind me I hear idle chatter from Jason and Casey as I drive to the funeral home. They talk about nothing, and they don't stop until we get to our destination. They stop just long enough to get out of the car and resume, continue as we walk up to the front entrance. I wonder if I am awake, if I am not still lying on that couch in the living room.

My heart is pounding, and I barely get through that door before I have to deal with the funeral director who doesn't know what to make of a sudden, secret fourth offspring. They probably don't cover this on the exam. I try to make it easier for him. In the course of this, I learn that the actual funeral doesn't begin for another hour. The idea is that family comes early to have some time with the deceased.

All too soon I am in the chapel itself, with Casey and Jason on either side of me. There it is up at the front, surrounded by flowers. It looks like an expensive casket and I am touched by anger from an unexpected source. He probably let his wishes be known before he died, not thinking of the further burden it would put on his widow. How is my mom going to manage, what is she going to live on? Will she have to sell the house — ? These are things I have not thought of until this instant when I see the shocking wasteful extravagance of that coffin.

I can see that there is a shape in it, one that gradually becomes familiar, until I am looking down at it, staring at it. Jason is already sniffling. He should be a guidepost for me, a constant demonstration of the appropriate times for tears. He acts normal until the sadness touches him and then he just lets go. He's got his head on straight, that kid.

My father always seemed enormous to me. He was, too, tall and broad if a bit flabby around the middle. Now he is lying there shrunken and absolutely, utterly still. I have never thought about how much of living is motion, even when one is supposedly still, just sleeping or breathing. Even at rest, the living move...while the dead are literally inanimate, like an object. And... his face doesn't look quite right. It is compressed, sunk in, bearing only a resemblance to its former self.

From nowhere I hear a loud, ungraceful sound and — oh, god, that's me. A violent emotion is taking hold and I can't stop it. I am sobbing aloud, my noises filling the chapel.

You disgust me were the last words I ever heard him speak, and truly, I am not angry anymore about that. I just have this desperate regret that I never made the effort to try to speak to him in all these years, to give him the opportunity to not die with those words on his conscience. He would probably have never taken them back, but he should have had the chance.

There is a hand on my arm, tugging me...leading me to a small comfortable alcove off to the side, no doubt put there just for occasions such as this. I can't speak, I am crying so hard, the kind of crying where embarrassment is long past a consideration. I am sitting now, and my head is being cradled, and dimly, I realize that it is Casey who is doing the cradling. He is rocking me too, and soothing my hair, and it occurs to me that my back is killing me here but then it is gone as I give myself over to this, overwhelmed.

During the middle of it I raise my head and notice that Jason and Anna are both in the room, and Anna is actually on my other side, not quite touching me. Jason is standing there red-eyed. No one has said a word all this time and I am still far too loud. "Sorry,"I choke out.

"Don't be silly," Anna says, putting her hand on me.

"Silly is s-something I'm...definitely...definitely am..." Which of course makes no sense. "I've always been the — ridic – ridiculous — " I hiccough. " — brother."

Casey's comment is, "Fuck that."

A throat is cleared. Apparently, my mother is in the room too, looking down at me; I'm not sure who made that disapproving noise, her or Anna. I pull up, struggling to get myself together. I can't...I can't...

"...can't..."

...can't let her see me like this. Not her.

"I'd like to talk to Alex."

Shit. Shit, shit, shit...does she have to do this to me now, why can't she leave? I can't keep it together in front of her. I don't want her to see me this way.

Everyone goes away as requested — except Casey, even when Mom is giving him the stare that used to wither me. He is unimpressed. He's faced down far scarier things.

"I'd like to talk to Alex," my mother repeats.

"You're not allowed to hurt him," Casey declares, drawing gasps from off- stage. He stands up and squares off with Mom, blocking her view of me and mine of her.

"Cas — " I croak.

"You don't hurt him."

"I'd like to talk to my son," my mother says, like the fact that she gave birth to me should be proof against her doing me harm.

Casey doesn't budge.

I finally get out an entire word. "Casey." A huge shudder moves through me. "It's okay."

In this instant I am completely aware that whatever connection I may have to this woman, Casey is my real family. Casey and Zeke and Jerry, they're it. It's something of a relief to me to know that I have not been spouting bullshit all this time, that the emotional truth matches with the hard facts. I feel stronger as a result. I can do this.

I raise my head and see that Casey is finally moving and my mother is taking a seat next to me. Casey lingers, on the cusp between the alcove and the chapel, waiting. My mother's stare at him still makes no impression.

"Okay, kitten."

He twitches, looks hard at me; he nods, and slips out of sight without a word.

If I think that Mom is going to start the conversation, I am mistaken. After a few seconds of waiting, I realize this, and I also realize that she is staring at me. "I didn't mean for this to happen," I say, hating my defensive tone.

"It's fine."

But still she is staring at me.

"What?" I demand.

She glances away, but just for an instant, like she can't help herself. "The last time I saw you, you were still a boy," she whispers.

"Oh." This hadn't even occurred to me. "Did I — do I — " Oh, hell. "How did I turn out?"

"Very handsome," she answers, smiling briefly. "And very tall. I don't know how I had such tall children."

If she gave me the slightest encouragement now, I would collapse, weeping in her lap, but I don't see any such signal from her. "Did you worry about me?" I hear myself say. "Did you?"

"Yes, I worried. You were only sixteen."

"But that didn't stop you from kicking me out."

She seems taken aback that I would be this blunt, blinking hard. I'm a little taken aback myself. I had no idea that I would be confronting her when I came here, even in this small way.

"Your father..." she begins, and just looks down at her lap.

Oh, I know how I am supposed to read this. I am supposed to feel bad for her even though she can't make herself say it, can't verbalize what we both know, that she was afraid to contradict or argue...that it was so far from the realm of possibility that she probably never said a fucking word against him. That it was easier for her to let me go. Or maybe, she didn't even want to not let me go.

"...you were doing..."

"What?" I say sharply.

"I said...your aunt let me know how you were...once in a while. After you moved..."

The conversation, such as it is, falters. I sniffle, wiping away a tear that rolls all the way down into the corner of my mouth. My eyes still burn but I'm getting nearer and nearer to my point of equilibrium. "What did you want to say to me, Mom?"

"I..." Again she is not looking at me. "It's...good to see you."

It's almost like a click in my head: Uh-huh. There is no surprise, nothing but a fulfilled lack of expectation if such a thing is possible.

This is why I came here wanting to do my duty and leave. I will get nothing from her and I know that. She will let me stay, make me coffee, offer cereal to Casey, make pleasantries, and see me on my way. She, like my father, is who she is — repressed and passive-aggressive and full of self-delusion. She probably tells herself there was no other way just so she doesn't have to admit to what she really thinks: her son is wrong and a sin, and her husband was right to send him away.

"Yeah," is all I have to say.

"I'm surprised that you..."

"That I what? Would come here? I almost didn't come you know, but my boyfriend has all these ideas about family being the most important thing in the world."

Her eyes flicker, and I remember that to her, "my boyfriend," is Casey. "Do his parents know about him?" she asks.

"Yes. And they still talk to him, believe it or not."

She shakes her head slightly.

I surprise myself yet again, asking, "Did Dad ever mention me? Did he ask about me?"

I was really, really not going to do this...but here I am. I should have known better — I do know better. I see her bite her lip and not answer, and in that I have my answer. I have the suspicion my father was far less upset about what I might do in the privacy of my bedroom than about the way I carry myself, the way I talk and act and emote. The fact that I've always preferred cooking to car repair, never mind that the world of professional cooking has always been just as male-dominated as that of mechanics. It doesn't matter what bothered him more, though, because the end result is that it — I— was not acceptable to him.

"Well," I say, and shrug. "Forget I asked."

"Alex..."

"What?"

"Will you sit next to me during the service?"

You know, I really want to refuse. I think she thinks I'm supposed to be grateful for this gesture while she gets to display me, tell everyone in her distant, unspoken way that it wasn't her fault — and get a jab in at Ernie and Ted and Lucy at the same time. I know this family too well. Every little petty nugget is going to be exacerbated, cherished and hovered over for years to come. I am going to say no —

"Okay," my mouth says, ignoring my brain.

Damn.

She smiles and pats my hand, and I suddenly can't wait for this day to be over so I can go home.

Which is what I am thinking, precisely, when I hear a shriek and a cry and a hubbub from the chapel, just the other side of the curtain, and an instant later I realize that the cry is in Casey's voice. I am up and out of that alcove within the next second. I see people scattered about looking dismayed — Anna, Peter, their spouses, Uncle Ted and Ernie and Aunt Lucy, and there is Casey near the head of the coffin. Ernie is right in his space — or maybe he is in Ernie's space, it is difficult to tell. They look like two cats ready to rumble, and Ernie hisses, "You little faggot!"

Maybe he is going to push Casey, maybe he isn't, but it doesn't really matter. I recognize, with dread, that Casey is standing there rigid with fists formed and ready at his sides. He is preparing to do whatever damage he can. His blue eyes blaze with equal parts terror and rage. He whispers something that I can't quite hear but I don't have to. Stay away from me...don't touch me.

I slip an arm between them and force Ernie back, away from Casey. "What's going on?"

"He — he — " pants Ernie. The man is still hammered. Or again hammered, whatever.

Behind me, Casey hisses, "He tried to — he t-touched — !" I hear him gulp on the last of the words, unable to make them take external form. Soon he will either be lashing out blindly or shutting down. Neither is a desirable option.

"Faggot!"

The funeral director is on-hand, trying to do his job. "Excuse me, friends, this isn't the place."

"That little freak was groping my — brother — touching his body!"

"You're just jealous!" Casey shoots back.

A gasp goes up, not entirely unjustified.

"Pervert," Ernie strangles.

"You know you want it," Casey mutters.

I spin around, find him stony-eyed and shivering. He is protecting himself the only way he knows now, making these most terrifying, impossible statements. Taking a risk, I grasp his arm. His eyes roll in his head, and he tugs on my grip...perhaps not as hard as he could, a sign that he is not beyond reason. "We're going outside," I whisper. "Casey? You hear? Outside."

That last word gets his attention. "Yes," he whispers back hoarsely. He lets me direct him down the center aisle of the chapel, through the lobby and down the front steps. I feel him tremble, then quake, and I don't stop until I am across the street in the tiny green park that forms the centre of the town of Butler Lake. In the middle there is a historical plaque that speaks of the town's history in the railroad and lumber industry. There are benches placed around it, for more sustained viewing.

Casey stands there and hunches a bit. I think he is still angry, still dangerous but with no outlet for it but himself now. "What happened?" I ask, not expecting too much from him at this point.

"He grabbed me."

"He says that you touched my dad's body — ?"

"I just touched his hand. I wanted to know what it felt like and — and that man, that — that — he grabbed — my arm."

"And then?"

Abruptly shamefaced, Casey faces the ground and admits, "I freaked."

"Un-huh."

"I...I pushed him."

"You couldn't have just..."

No. I am not going to blame Casey, I am not going to make this about him. He's had way too much of that already, from Roy.

He didn't instigate this. Touching my father's body is not a sin, and it was Ernie who overreacted, triggering Casey's panic. These moments when Casey loses control and misbehaves, I have to accept them and not make a big deal about them because they don't happen often and he is constantly working on making them stop. If he didn't try so hard to be the way we all want him to be, he wouldn't be so easy to forgive.

"Sorry," Casey whispers.

I shake my head. "You didn't do anything wrong."

"I'll bet you're sorry you brought me," Casey mutters, having completely lost his defiant edge. In fact, he is shaky and miserable. He is doing that thing with his lip.

"No, kitten, no, of course I'm not sorry. I don't know what I'd have done without you here."

"Really?" he asks, looking up at me hopefully.

"For sure." Tentatively, I squeeze his shoulder, wishing I could just fold him into a full-body hug. I can't, though; I know this and I know it again when he twitches, just barely allowing it. "You know, I think tonight I'm going to be in need of a drink. We'll go to a bar, just you and me. Tomorrow we'll be heading home. Sound good?"

Casey starts to nod. Jason's voice intrudes, "What's this about alcohol?" Casey jumps hard, twisting to peer at my younger brother. Jason adds, with a hopeful look, "And I'm not invited?"

"You — " Casey stammers. "I — you can come — too — I guess."

I almost kick him, and change my mind. Casey is doing an amazing job of socializing with my brother, and I should provide positive reinforcement rather than deterring him.

"Is everything okay?" Jason asks.

"I think so," I reply.

Suddenly a huge grin splits Jason's face. "You're my new hero," he tells Casey.

"Wh-what?" Casey stutters.

"You had half the old biddies in this town ready to faint."

Casey frowns and hugs himself. "Oh."

I scowl in Jason's direction. He takes the hint and amends, "Okay, listen. Don't you give a fuck about Uncle Ernie. He's an old drunk and everyone knows it. Probably a closet case, too."

Casey doesn't say anything.

"They're going to start," Jason says to me. "Mom's asking for you."

I look at Casey, who says right away, "I can't go back in there yet."

I agree with him, but now I have a problem. "Then we'll just stay here."

"You can't. You can't miss the funeral."

"Kitten, I'd rather be here."

"I know you would," he says softly, pinning me out of nowhere with a stare of pure understanding. "And that means you have to go in."

"Yeah," Jason agrees, "and Mom is saving a seat for you, you had better use it."

Still. They are correct, but it is a lovely Wisconsin day and I would so much rather be out here enjoying it than in there. Plus, Casey is in one of those moods when he might take off on some crazy adventure. I am terrified of this, in fact. There are all kinds of different, new trouble he could find here. Wood ticks. Hypothermia. Bears. Lions...and tigers, oh, my.

"Sasha," Casey says, almost pleading.

If I don't go, he'll blame himself. I don't want to do that to him. "Do you promise not to move from this spot?"

Jason snorts and shakes his head, while Casey nods. "Yes."

"You promise."

"I swear."

"Okay, because — "

"Geez!" Jason laughs. "Sasha, you're being ridiculous!"

He's a quick one, my kid brother.

"You hafta go," Casey urges.

"You're okay with this?"

He shrugs. "Sure."

I close my eyes, taking a moment for myself. "Well...okay." More or less — mainly less — re-charged, I head inside.

The chapel is packed now. People are standing along the walls in the back and along the sides. I see Mr. Henderson, I see the two men from the store, my second-grade teacher, the neighbours, the guys from the shop, and on and on. I walk confidently down the middle aisle to the front, aware of the hushed whispers surrounding me, and I sit next to my mother. Anna is on her other side — which means that Peter has been displaced. He sits next to me and glowers straight out, not looking at me.

Reverend Walberg comes out from behind a curtain somewhere and begins.

You see one funeral, you've seen them all. There are the roster of applicable sections from the bible, and the bullshit. I don't mean to sound cynical, but the point of all this is to make us feel better, right? Not that my father was entirely devoid of positive qualities, but between Peter and Uncle Ernie, he gets painted as some sort of American folk hero. Add to that some loud lamenting by first my Aunt Lucy and then Mrs. Garner, and Ernie nearly breaking down on the pulpit...bullshit, and I mean that in the most humane way.

Oh, and according to Ernie, my father had only three children. He didn't just avoid mentioning my name; he actually used the word three and described how proud my father was of each of them.

I'd be lying if I said it doesn't hurt — but it doesn't hurt all that much either. It wasn't unexpected, and really, I'll be glad to get back to my real life. I'm not sorry I came, but I understand now that I am here to say goodbye.

When the service is over, we are notified that interment will follow, and after that a reception in the basement of St. Urho's Lutheran. Jason joins Peter and my two uncles in bearing the coffin down the aisle. It takes a while to get out the door, what with everyone jamming up the place, some trying to offer condolences. A lot of people approach me, acting like I have been here all along, or was just off on vacation for a while. I shake hands and make nice, knowing that my appearance, Casey's outburst and my mother's decision to have me sit next to her will be fodder for gossip for months, if not years.

Once I am outside, I am sweating heavily inside my suit jacket. I am also very relieved to see Casey standing on the steps. He stands out like some sleek, gorgeous black bird amidst a bunch of fat pigeons. I go to him immediately and I know that now he is ready for a hug. I get all of him in my arms, comforted by the fact of him. "Is it over?" he murmurs.

"Well, there's the interment, and then a reception."

"Kay."

"Do you want to walk to the cemetery?"

"That depends on how far it is," he jokes, as though he is still that kid who flees from exercise when in fact he's probably way more fit than I am these days.

"Fifteen minutes."

"Okay."

We slip away; I make a point of not catching my mother's eye, or anyone else's. We simply set out along the sidewalk, in no hurry as the convoy with the hearse hasn't even started moving yet.

"It's not a bad little town," Casey comments, taking in the main square, which just happens to be almost the entirety of Butler Lake. The rest is just houses, a school, a few churches and various industrial enterprises and falling down, abandoned buildings.

"It's awful," I say. "I was so bored when I was a teenager."

"I don't mind it."

"Just try living here."

We walk a little further.

"Did I screw up?" Casey asks then, his voice brave even through the slight tremor.

I shake my head. "Nah. I mean, I don't ever want you to be distressed, of course, but I'm with Jason on this one. I also don't mind seeing people get a little shaken up."

"Your mom's gonna hate me."

"I don't know that. Hell, I don't really know what she thinks about me, but you know? I don't really care."

"What about your brothers and Anna?"

I shrug. "Oh, Peter definitely hates me."

"I don't think so."

"Hmm."

"And...er, Jason would like to get to know you better."

This is a slight surprise. Not so much that Jason wants to renew our relationship because I could see that for myself, but that my little brother seems to have developed a friendship with Casey in such a short time. I suppose it has something to do with the fact that they are much closer in age than any of the other people currently in my mother's house. It makes sense that they would bond, kinda.

"When did he tell you that?"

"Last night...when I went out to talk to Zeke. He was having a smoke. He keeps asking me questions about you. I think he missed you after you left."

"Why doesn't he talk to me?"

"Maybe he finds me easier to talk to," Casey says with a cheeky, sidewise glance.

"Right, because I'm so intimidating."

"Maybe you are, to him."

"He just saw me blubbering over our Dad's coffin, Casey."

Casey seems to hold his breath. Then he says, "Speaking of which...are you okay?"

"Yes. I just needed to get that out of me. I'm just fine."

"Sasha."

"Yeah..."

"You ever hear of that river in Egypt?"

"Oh, come on... not everyone has parent issues, Casey."

"Actually, I'm pretty sure that they do."

"Okay, then, but I mean...not serious issues."

"Whatever you say...Zeke."

I clasp my hands to my heart. "Ah! You wound me, kitten."

"I'm just saying."

"Geesh. A few months of therapy and suddenly he's a psychiatric expert."

We have reached the gates of the cemetery. Casey looks around and up at the sky, and I have to agree that it is a very interesting one. When you live in cities, you get used to not seeing very much of it; in a way, coming back to a place like this, my overwhelming impression is one of flatness, even if the land is in reality lumpy and rocky. The sky is so wide and close, and today it is full of sunshine, just occasionally having to pierce high, grandiose clouds. They cast odd, misshapen shadows as they pass.

"I wish I had my camera," Casey says.

I cough. "Probably best to have left it in the car."

"Yeah, I know."

"For the sky?"

"For the tombstones, mostly. And I'd like to take pictures of the people. Do you think they'd mind?"

"You're kidding, I hope?"

He is almost smiling at me. "It's not like I have anything to lose."

I shake my head. "I still have to be able to talk to them, kitten."

"Okay," he says quickly. "I'm sorry, Sasha. I don't want to make it harder — "

"Hey. Relax, you. I know you weren't serious."

We have beaten the hearse and its convoy, but I have a pretty good idea of where to find the family plot. Casey and I head over there to wait, and easily find the open hole in the earth. Nearby, are the graves of my father's parents and an older uncle who died as a child. We stay back a little, watching as the mourners file in, shuffling along behind the coffin and its pallbearers.

This part is relatively short. The minister reads aloud the traditional passage. I may not have mentioned this, but I have been to a few funerals in Cincinnati, when friends of mine — not close friends, but friends all the same — died of AIDS. I've heard this "dust-to-dust" speech more than enough.

Casey reaches for my hand and just holds it.

I'm not sure when I started to cry, but I know I am crying when they lower Dad in. Oh, well...might as well do this right, get it all out of my system. God, I hate the idea of being trapped in the ground like that. I mean, I know that technically, it won't matter to me but it'll be easier to confront death in the first place if I know that's not going to happen to me. On the other hand, I suppose being incinerated in an oven is a little scary for some...what the hell am I thinking about, anyway?

In the church basement, there is a wide variety of donated, homebaked goods and a gigantic urn of appallingly bad coffee, as well as a cooler full of McDonald's scary orange drink for the kids. Casey helps himself to the latter, and some no doubt tooth-achingly sweet bars with chocolate and coconut. We sit with the family in folding chairs, at folding tables. Anna's and Peter's kids raise a ruckus up on the stage until two of them, both girls of maybe eight or so, consult for a minute and then come running over to me.

"Hi," one says. I think she must be Anna's daughter. "Mom says you're my uncle."

"That's right," I say. "And you're my niece. What's your name?"

"Britney."

"Cool."

She looks unerringly at Casey. "Are you my uncle, too?"

"Brit!" Anna whispers.

Britney just gazes roundly at her mother and continues as though nothing at all was said — and I must say, I like her style — "Are you gay?"

"Brit-ney!"

"Yeah," Casey replies.

"You and Uncle Sasha live in the same house?"

"It's an apartment, but yeah."

"Why do you have make-up on?"

I hold my breath while Casey mulls responses. He comes out with, "Because it's fun."

"My mommy won't let me wear any."

"Oh, I guess...yeah, I guess you have to be older."

The other girl, who must be Peter's, blurts, "My daddy says boys don't wear make-up."

Peter has gone very red. I would have thought he'd have learned by now to watch what he says in front of children. He's been a parent for how many years, he should know how offhand comments can come back to bite him in the ass. Hell, even I know it. I intervene, "Your daddy's wrong. Some boys do."

"On TV they do," the girl agrees solemnly.

"Yes."

"You have to wear make-up if you go on TV, my teacher says."

Peter stands. "I'll be outside," he says, evidently angry. He strides out, while his wife, to whom I have not even been introduced, looks agitated, like she thinks she should follow. Anna pats her hand and she stays put.

Not terribly concerned, Britney says to Casey, "Your eyes are super blue."

Casey takes it in stride. "Thank you."

I decide it's time for me and Peter to have a talk. I get up, ignoring Anna's strained expression, and go to find him. He isn't hard to find. I spot him pacing in the parking lot and scramble up, feeling very much like a younger, albeit taller, brother.

"I don't want to talk to you," he says, seeing me.

"Too bad."

"Too bad? What're you gonna do, then? Hold me down and shout?"

"Peter."

"Tell me you are not with him."

"Huh?"

"Casey. You can't actually be with him."

"I'm just as gay as he is, Peter."

"He's a child, Alex! Geez...I never thought so badly of you that you would — you'd use someone like — that — " He is shaking his head, and shaking too. "God almighty, is he even legal?"

"This is what's bothering you?"

"Among other things."

I have to amend my assumptions. Is it possible that all this time Peter's main objection to me is that I appear to be a pedophile, for which I can scarcely blame him? I would think the same thing if I saw Casey with someone my age. "Casey is twenty," I feel compelled to say in my own defense.

Peter rolls his eyes. "Sure."

"No, he really is. I know how he looks, but he is."

"But you're still a lot older...and I have the feeling he's not entirely...normal."

Okay. Officially, I can't stand it. "First of all, no one is normal, Pete, and second...what if I told you that Casey and I are just friends? Roommates."

"I'd say why did you lie to us then...on top of everything else?"

I fold my arms. "What everything else?"

He is able to hold back only for a few seconds. "I can't believe that in twelve years you haven't changed!"

"I've changed tons — "

"Everything's still all about you."

My mouth gapes, I feel it hanging there, wide open.

"You waltz in at the last second and demand Mom give you a place here, and — never mind that I've been here all along dealing with the doctors and the lawyers, answering the goddamned phone. I'm the one who should have been sitting next to her, I should have — !"

He stops abruptly, like he is realizing just how much of his personal feelings he's revealing. I just wait, devoid of a response. I am too surprised, and well on my way to angry.

"It's not fair," he resumes, more calmly. "I've been the dutiful son, you took off and never even tried to get in touch."

"They said I was dead to them."

"So? You didn't have to believe it. You could have tried but you just vanished — oh, and then I hear from Anna that you're talking to her, but not me. Never me!"

He spins suddenly and presents me with his back, which is heaving.

"Fuck, Pete," I whisper. "I had no idea."

"No one in this family has any idea."

"I thought..."

"Of course I don't approve of your lifestyle," he says, turning back to me. "I think it's wrong and I can't change that but that doesn't mean I never want to speak to you again. I'm not Dad."

So now we are staring at each other, aware that we both want to talk but having no idea where to start. "Okay," I allow, figuring it can't hurt. "You're not Dad."

Something in him seems to loosen. "And Casey's not your boyfriend."

"No."

He swallows. "Do you — do you have a boyfriend?"

"Yes."

"Why didn't he come?"

"I asked him not to."

He gives me a long, revising look. Suddenly we both seem to be out of steam, and with nothing to say.

"Where do you live, anyway?" I ask.

"Milwaukee."

"Hmm."

"I'm a manager in an accounting firm."

"I'm a chef."

"I know."

We are quiet some more, not really sure what to do with this sudden accord that has risen up between us. Then I venture, "I'm sorry if it seems like I'm stealing the limelight."

"I don't want the limelight — just some appreciation."

"I'm sure Mom appreciates you."

"If she did she would never say so."

I sigh, "That's true. Look, you know she was just making a little drama by asking me to sit next to her. I'm sorry, it felt like it wasn't worth arguing about." Looking at him, I add, "If it helps, I don't think I'm ever coming back here again."

"But..."

"But what?"

"She's your mother."

"I don't fit here." I shrug. "I remember I told this friend of mine that you can never go home, not really. I still think that's true."

Peter looks regretful but doesn't disagree. "That's sad."

"Not really. I have a home...it's just not here."

"Huh. Well, do you think you might be able to stand talking to me once in a while? I'll never claim to understand the way you live but I would like to know what you're up to...if you're alive."

I can dismiss the way he says The way you live, as though he actually knows enough to disapprove of it. I even let him have a smile. "I can do that. Can't help you with Mom, but I can do that."

"I guess that's not your fault anyway," he admits. "It's not even about you, it's been building up for weeks now."

I could well imagine.

"Yeah," he sighs. "You don't have to comment. Let's just go back in, shall we?"

"Sure. Hey — it looks like Casey and Jason and I are going out for a few drinks tonight. Do you want to join us?"

He stares for a second, then says, "I could use a drink."

When we get back, Casey and Jason have abandoned the table and are playing some sort of game with the two little girls, one that involves running, giggling and shrieking. I am more embarrassed than ever by the notion that people believe I am with Casey. While I know that to some people — namely, Zeke — he exudes sex appeal, to me he is just so very young. He might as well be my kid brother.

I can see Peter is thinking something similar as he watches the goings-on. I can also see Ernie watching Casey from time to time and I wonder. Maybe Jason wasn't so very far off, calling Ernie a closet case — or maybe Jason has missed the boat altogether. Maybe it is a fascination, yes, a horrified fascination that some people have for anything that abuses their assumptions about the world. The more the Ernies watch, the more they wonder about themselves and so they keep watching, looking for a way to have the thing make sense. And they start to hate the thing making them watch instead of admitting that they hate themselves.

Isn't that right, Roy?

I do try not to dwell on Roy too much, because it still does make me angry. Confronting him will accomplish nothing, as Zeke has already proved. Still, I have an imagination. I do picture myself showing up at his apartment or his office, like Zeke did, and demanding an accounting. For a while after Zeke told me about his visit, I had it in my head that I would write Roy a letter, something so insightful and powerful that after reading it he would be stricken with desperate guilt and never forgive himself. I even wrote a few first drafts consisting of a paragraph or two each before I gave up. I realized that Roy has already done what, for him, is an act of profound generosity: He has expressed his intention to ignore Casey's existence from here on in. Zeke says I can't be entirely sure of that, but I do feel quite sure. Call it intuition, or call it confidence in Roy's terror of public embarrassment. Whatever it is, he is going to stay away as a gesture of good faith that we will stay away from him. The last thing any of us should want to do is go stirring Roy up at this point.

I could get angry or outraged at Ernie now too, but I have learned enough to know that to acknowledge him is to give him too much power. Like Roy, he is pitiful to me. There will always be Ernies and Roys and Walter Johanssons, people who allow their fear of community judgment to determine who they are and what they do, getting all twisted up inside as a result and twisting everyone else too. I don't hate them. I feel sorry for them, because I sincerely doubt that they will ever know love — real, authentic love, not necessarily anything to do with sex or romance or blood.

I've gotta think that wherever my father is, he's figured that out now.

Losing someone is exhausting. First off, part of you is torn out, and if that isn't enough, people descend upon you, determined never to leave you alone for an instant. Their intentions are good, but they place the pressure and responsibility upon you of having to respond in kind to their efforts.

I'm not talking about me here so much as I am my mother. I can only imagine what she's feeling. I haven't seen my father in years so I certainly don't miss him like she must...and still I am exhausted with all the activity. After the official reception there is the unofficial reception back at the house. There are more meat trays, more casseroles, another frozen lasagna. An entire turkey, frozen solid, that goes right into the deep freeze. Apparently, Mom won't feel like cooking for the next year. I know that all this giving comes from a good place but at the same time...I'm just worn out.

In addition to the socializing, there are the children. They know what's going on but it doesn't touch them in the same way, and they are being their normal, slightly rambunctious selves. At some point, Casey volunteers to take them out on a photographic field trip, brilliantly removing the irritants of both himself and the children. And I wish I could dream up a reason not to let him go but he is quite comfortable, unthreatened by them or by this particular part of the world that scares the bejeezus out of me.

Instead, I end up trapped in the living room, making small talk with various relatives and friends. I have been completely deprived of any role in the kitchen, which is firmly occupied by Anna and Mrs. Garner. I repeatedly answer questions about how long I am staying, what I do, where I live and so on, until I begin to wish I could just hang a sign around my neck that reads: I'm staying until tomorrow, when I fly back to Seattle. I work as a chef there. Yes, I like it very much.

Around suppertime, Casey and the girls are back, spilling into the living room like a river bursting its seams. Britney, I can see, has fallen in love with him, and Peter's girl also seems pretty enamoured — I really should find out her name at some point. "We took pictures!" Britney crows. "Casey's going to email them to me, Mommy!"

"Really?" Anna replies, casting an approving look upon Casey. "What were the pictures of?"

"Flowers!"

"There are flowers out?"

"Some little ones!"

I appeal silently to Casey, desperate for him to do something now to get me out of this house, to go for a walk or something. He meets my gaze but looks blank and I must say, I am disappointed that after all this time he doesn't know how to read my mind.

Inadvertently, Jason offers rescue. "I'm going out for a smoke," he says to Casey. "Wanna come along?" Jason has been stepping out for smokes all afternoon. He's had that excuse while I had none.

"Um..." Casey hesitates. "Okay."

"I'll join you," I throw in quickly.

When we get out there, Jason immediately lights up and I know that he's having a hard time too, just by the way that he sucks on that cigarette. I recognize need when I see it, and my crankiness towards him dissolves.

"I'm — " Casey says. "I think I should call Z — call home."

He has his needs too. He's been separated from Zeke for nearly forty-eight hours now. As for Zeke, he will be climbing the walls and chain smoking, or he would if Stokely let him. He's been obliged to go elsewhere for his nasty habit since he moved in with her. I hope that it's slowed him down a bit.

I join Jason in leaning against the wall of our house, watching him puff, and my normally repressed, archaic urge to smoke begins to rear its head. I decide I will resist; if I could watch Jason escaping periodically all afternoon, I can go the rest of the day and then this will pass.

"I think I should tell you," Jason says once Casey is well out of earshot but still in sight, chattering to Zeke in Seattle, "I know Casey's not your boyfriend."

I roll my eyes. It seems that no one believes me around here — and I'm kind of relieved. "Oh, yeah?"

"I asked him and he admitted it."

"Great," I mutter. "Now everyone thinks I'm a liar."

"Not everyone," Jason teases. God, the smoke from his cigarette smells good. "Just me." He adds, "I don't care if you're with him or not."

"Oh?"

"Yeah. I..." Jason plays with a tiny puddle, drawing a wet line on the asphalt with his toe. "I want you to know...I don't really mind...I mean, not that you care what I think."

"I care," I say softly, touching his arm.

He glances up at me, then away. "I was confused when they kicked you out. I kept asking what you did and they would never say. Pete finally told me."

I shake my head, appalled at my own self-centredness. I could have at least tried to stay in touch with my siblings, especially my little brother who had kind of looked up to me. Peter was right; I've been so totally wrapped up in my own drama, and then Casey's, I forgot about the impact on my brothers and sister. I just assumed they hated me along with everyone else in the family.

"I'm sorry, Jason," I say now. "Really."

He shakes his head, looking embarrassed. I must remember that Jason is your typical dude, or your typical twenty-four-year old dude, at least. He is not accustomed to talking about his feelings at any length. "Do you email?" he asks.

"Sometimes."

"I'll give you my email at school. Maybe I could even come to Seattle?"

I am astonished. "Sure, Jase." I doubt it will ever happen, but I'm touched that he would suggest it.

"Damn, I wish we could just go have a beer right now," Jason says.

"Yeah."

"Actually...I wish this was all over and I could just go back to school." He tosses a look sideways, openly begging me to tell him it is all right, that he is not terrible.

"I know what you mean," I say.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. I kind of...want everything to be normal again. And it's not like I'm not going to be thinking about Dad, or that I'm not sad...but life just goes on. There's no way to stop it. And I wouldn't want to."

He nods, seemingly more comfortable now. For several moments I indulge in the fantasy of getting to know this boy, my brother. Of him visiting, the two of us laughing sometimes and talking seriously sometimes, me showing him all the best of Seattle. Then I force this all out of my head. This is the stuff of unhappiness, this...this wanting something that might not ever happen. If it does, I will be happy about it, but I will not expect anything.

Casey is back, busy tucking his cellphone away in a pocket.

"How's Zeke?" I ask.

"Okay. I think..." Casey bites his lip, then continues, "I think he's mad at me."

"Kitten," I warn.

"I'm just saying," he defends. "He sounds like he does when he's mad about something completely irrational. Like he's fighting it but he still can't help it." Casey hunches a bit. "Think I'll go in now for a bit."

"Okay."

The screen door swings shut after Casey, followed by the heavier thud of the inner door. Jason drops the remains of his cigarette and stomps on it.

"You really shouldn't do that," I say.

"What?"

"Smoke."

"Sasha..." Jason groans. "I don't usually so much...just when I'm in bars, usually."

"Uh-huh."

"I'm going to stop. As soon as this is all over."

"That's good."

"He's really different."

"What?"

"Casey. He's different."

I consider possible answers. "He's had a different life," I settle on. "But hey, what about me? Aren't I different?"

"Sure," Jason says, and pats my arm for a second. "You're plenty different."

"Don't do me any favours."

"It's just different in a different way."

"Oh, that makes a whole lot of sense."

"Okay, then, screw you. You're totally normal."

"How dare you!" I cry, being sure to sound facetious. But I do feel an odd jealousy towards Casey, suddenly. I'm used to being the alien in the family, after all. With him around, I am boringly ordinary...and how silly is this, anyway? I'm actually mourning for the pain of being the outsider? If anyone should know how not easy it is to be Casey, it's me. I think it's just — being here, in Butler Lake and with Casey, means that all my assumptions about myself, the things I count on for my identity, all those things are right in my face. For years now I have prided myself on my strength in overcoming my own life drama, thinking I'm to be congratulated on my lack of bitterness when I've really built my identity on being Sasha, Cast Out at Sixteen, isn't he amazing and brave? Meanwhile, I have had three siblings who wouldn't have minded being allowed into my life, and the people of Butler Lake have been unexpectedly gracious, even if it is just ordinary good manners.

"What's wrong?" Jason asks.

"Nothing."

I'm just full of shit, is all. Still. Again.

God, I can't wait until it feels like the right time to head out to the bar.

By the time that the visitors have thinned it is well and truly evening, and I have figured out that it is only right that Anna come along too. She barely blinks when I mention it to her, leading me to think that Peter might have already invited her...which is just fine. We decide that we should go to Dad's place, to Miller's. There is some hesitation, but only because we're afraid of running into Ernie or Ted there, but once we have seen Ernie escorted home by Aunt Lucy, well on his way to passing out, we figure it's safe enough.

This bar is the place my father came nearly every day of his life. It is really quite a dive but the only other option is the Scandinavian Hall down the street, which is more popular with the younger crowd and bound to be noisy. My dad's watering hole is so very like Moe's on The Simpsons, it's funny. It's a dirty space with a bunch of horny old regulars, a stained bar, a few ramshackle booths. We get a pitcher and sit at a booth, the five of us. I am worried that Casey is not welcome but there is no question of leaving him amongst my mother and her guests, not tonight, and I see no signs from Anna or Peter that they resent his presence.

Five glasses are brought; there is no concern about the legalities, it seems. I say nothing as Jason pours and Casey reaches for one with a mischievous glance at me. I deliberately don't react. He takes a sip, making a face that is absolutely charming in its childlike distaste.

Jason laughs at him. "I know, it's kind of crappy." And he takes down half of his glass. If I didn't know better, I would say he's showing off.

I pace myself. I am not a big drinker; in truth I have just been looking forward to getting out of that house. I am happy to sit here and watch Jason and Casey being young, while Peter and Anna talk about legal and financial details. Much of it goes over my head, but the gist of it seems to be that Uncle Jake is going to buy out my mother's interest in the auto repair business and that, along with her pension, should be enough for her to survive on. My father owned the house and so now title has passed to her and she will only have to worry about the taxes.

Soon, talk turns to Peter and Anna's lives in Milwaukee. They see each other quite often, apparently. The other three of us at the table are somewhat left out, and so I decide that it is time to wrest away some control of the conversation.

"Hey," I say, after our second pitcher has been delivered. "Let's drink a toast."

My older siblings stare uneasily at me.

"To our father. Walter Johansson. He wasn't perfect, but he worked hard in his life and he tried to teach us the important stuff."

There are looks of relief and gratitude all around. "To Walter!" chorus the others, Casey included.

"You know what I was thinking about," Peter says, wiping foam off his lip. "Remember how he took us all camping and he would work his butt off setting up that stupid fold-out camper while we goofed off? I always wondered why he did that. Where was the fun in it for him?"

"He did get to go fishing," Anna suggests.

"He could have done that by himself," I say. "He wanted us to have that experience."

"You went camping?" Casey puts in, and giggles.

"I don't know what you're implying."

Anna snickers.

"Oh, shit, I'd love to see Sasha in the wild," Casey adds.

Peter finally seems willing to relax and join the fun. "Mr. Fancy Pants stayed in the trailer all weekend."

"Yeah," I chime in, "and who got a decent night's sleep while the rest of you were scratching and whining?"

"I think that's part of the fun," Jason intones.

"I prefer to take my fun more like fun."

Casey says, "I heard you promise Jerry — "

I cut him off. "— shh!"

"What?" Jason urges.

"Casey," I warn.

He is the incarnation of naughty, looking directly my way as he informs on me. "He promised Jerry he would go camping this summer."

"Jerry?" Anna wonders.

"His boyfriend."

I give Casey's arm a smack, just a tap really, looking to Anna who still doesn't know about my lie — except Anna doesn't seem all that surprised. "Just a sec," I say. "Did anyone ever believe me when I said — ?"

"I was shocked for a few minutes," Anna says. "Then I realized you were totally yanking our chain. You always liked to go for the shock value."

"I can't believe this."

"And Pete told me you told him."

I mutter, "Crap."

"You didn't have to lie to us, you know," Anna says. "If your boyfriend didn't feel comfortable about coming...that's understandable."

It is confirmed. I am an absolute ass.

"So tell us about him," Anna finishes.

I look to Peter. He is drinking his beer and doesn't look entirely comfortable, but he isn't going to protest.

"His name is Jerry...like Casey mentioned."

"Yeah, we got that part," Jason snarks.

"He's very tall and fit. He likes to work out. Actually...he's just kind of an ordinary guy. He even has these blockheaded ideas about camping and climbing mountains and shit like that...kind of like Pete here."

Peter protests, "I've never thought I need to climb a mountain. And I haven't been camping in years."

"But you hunt."

"For the meat."

"Tell us more about Jerry," Anna cuts in.

"He's just a really kind, thoughtful, decent guy," I say. "Family means everything to him." I falter, once again appreciating what I have done, how compared to Jerry I am a complicated mess, and it gets very quiet. I finish, "Obviously, he's very patient."

I get the laugh I was going for, and the mood is once again lighthearted at the booth. The conversation turns to childhood memories, remembering the good times with our father and mother, the tangles and sometimes all-out war between the four of us. Like the time Anna and Jason and I had a sleep out in the back yard (Jason being included only under duress) and ended up convincing ourselves in the middle of the night that there was Something out there, and we ran screaming for the house. I was twelve at the time but Anna was all of fifteen, and got the stern talking to the next morning, poor girl.

There was the time that Dad and Mom took us to Cedar Point Amusement Park in Ohio. That was one of my best memories, even if I did throw up after the Tilt-A- Whirl. I seem to recall that Dad looked a little green too.

Or the time I knocked out one of Jason's teeth with a frisbee...completely by accident of course. I also remember, fondly, helping Anna get ready for her first date, giving her my opinions on colours and accessories. Could anyone have actually been surprised at my coming out? Yeah, apparently they could.

After a few hours and four pitchers we're all feeling pretty upbeat and in love with the world. Casey has had a glass or two himself and he is smiling a lot, giggling at random moments. Impromptu, he takes out his phone and calls Zeke to tell him he is drunk for the first time ever.

"Hi, Zeke. Guess what? I'm drunk."

Zeke has a comment.

"Two glasses."

This is undoubtedly where Zeke tells Casey he's a lightweight.

"Yeah, I know. Hey, Zeke? I miss you...if I were there, you know what I'd do?" Everyone at the table suddenly goes quiet, but the sultry tone in Casey's voice disappears, drowned in a shriek of laughter. "I was hoping you would remember that!" Casey hugs the phone to his chest and tells us breathlessly, "He did Jimmy." Peter gulps, no doubt taking this the wrong way. I make pleading eyes at Casey and he explains, "He said that line ‘but you were somewhat worse for wine'...er, well, it's champagne but Zeke said ‘somewhat worse for beer...and there are rules about those things.' He does a really good impersonation of Jimmy's accent." Casey is glowing right now, and I wonder how he can not realize that he loves Zeke. "Here," Casey says, shoving the phone at me.

"Zeke," I say into it.

"Hey, Sasha."

"You impersonated Jimmy Stewart again?"

"I guess I did. Sasha, why are you letting him drink?"

"Oh, really, sweetie. I know you don't care that much if he has a few beers."

"Maybe I do."

"Nope. I don't buy it."

"Who's driving?"

"Zeke, honey — we'll walk home."

"Sasha..."

"Yah?"

"Is everything okay?"

"Everything's just fine." I wink at Casey. "We'll be home late tomorrow night. You wanna come pick us up at the airport?"

"Sure, I guess. What's your flight number?"

"Don't remember. I just remember we land around 9:00 or something like that."

"Okay, but...um, how did the funeral go?"

"Like you'd expect. My brothers and sister and Casey and me are just out for a drink right now and I think I'll phone Jerry."

"Isn't he at work?"

Shit. Right. Stupid of me, like Jerry isn't at work every night of the week. I should have called earlier but I forgot and now it looks like I am not going to be keeping my promise, yet again.

"Crap," I sigh. "Well...I'm gonna go."

"Sasha, don't let Casey drink too much."

"Not to worry, sweetie!" I don't bother to tell him that Casey actually switched to soda, over an hour ago now. He said the beer was making him dizzy.

We sign off. I get up and go into the men's bathroom, where I call Jerry's answering machine and leave a message that will probably embarrass me when I think about it in the morning. I then go back to the table, only to discover that everyone is getting ready to leave.

"Hey!"

"We've got spouses holding the fort," Peter explains. "And we need time to sober up before driving back to the hotel."

"But it's only..." I seek the time, spot it above the bar. "...nine-thirty."

"Sorry," Peter says briefly. He claps a hand on my shoulder. "Listen. Anna and I were talking and we think we should have a Johansson sibling reunion — this fall, we were thinking. I'll play host. What do you say?"

I feel my eyes get heavy, my throat filling. "Even though I'm a...self-centered jerk?"

Peter shakes his head and clears his throat. "If you can't be a jerk with your family, when can you?"

"Right," I say, my voice hoarse.

"So you'll come."

"Yes, I...and...I'd like to bring Jerry."

He just nods, looking elsewhere, then breaks away, heading for the door.

"But I don't want to go back to that house," I proclaim to whomever might be listening. "Not yet."

"Ditto," Jason's voice agrees from behind me. "Why don't we just go for a walk? We can walk down to the lake." He appeals to Casey. "What do you say?"

"I dunno," I hedge. "Kitten...it gets a bit cold here at night."

"Oh, Sasha!" Casey complains. "Give me a break, I'm not going to catch pneumonia."

"Okay," I relent. "Okay."

It is actually quite lovely out. You never know what you'll get here in early June, but tonight it has decided to be almost-summer. They sky holds only a few clouds, giving us a glorious, full celestial display the likes of which can never be enjoyed in the city. God, I had forgotten that. I stare up at the sky while I walk, occasionally staggering a little, following the sound of Jason and Casey talking about science fiction movies. It has become a game of "have you seen?" and "wasn't that just the worst?"

Now we are at the municipal beach. There is a small boat launch, and a few kids are sitting around a fire there. We greet them as we pass, continuing on along the sand until we get to the edge of the beach and the path that goes around the lake. "Let's do the path," Jason proposes.

"Uh, no," I return. It isn't a long way, maybe a mile altogether as this is actually quite a small lake, linked by a shallow channel into a series of deeper, larger lakes. There is a rope and wood bridge across the narrowest point of the channel and I've crossed it many times in my life. It was something we all did in the course of normal summer day activities, as kids. I just don't feel like revisiting it tonight. I want to sit here on the beach and stare up at the stars.

But Jason is obsessed, for some reason. "Casey, you want to?"

"No," I decree, immediately.

"Why not?"

"It's dark. There could be bears."

"I know the path, the moon is out and there could be bears anywhere in this town at any time. Anyway, you know they're probably all hanging out at the dump."

"Casey," I plead.

Casey's face is in shadow, but I have the impression that he's wearing that determined look. He says, "I want to, Sasha."

Of course he does. Because I said he shouldn't I throw up my hands. "Fine. Whatever. I'm going to stay here." I crook my finger at Jason, drawing him aside. "You can't touch him," I warn.

He reacts like I punched him. "What? I'm not — "

"Okay, I didn't mean that how it sounds."

"What do you think I am?"

"I mean — literally, Jason. Don't brush arms or pat his hand or anything. Got it?"

Jason stares at me. "I get it — sorta."

I'm not really worried. Not much. This is child's play, literally. When kids get hurt around here, it's almost always alcohol-and-boat related, or alcohol-and-snow- machine. The path is very well worn, broad, and they will be back in an hour or less. I sit down on a convenient log to wait, staring at the stars reflected in Butler Lake. It is a calm night, bright with moonlight.

Of course, my mind goes immediately to my mother. Some of my worries have been put to rest. She will be able to get along just as she is, it seems. Good for her. Finances will not be a problem, and there will be people around constantly to check on her. Jason will be home in the summers and Peter and Anna will be around...not to mention my uncles and aunts and the neighbours. She has plenty of support, and I have seen no signs that she is devastated by grief.

That's funny, I sound like I'm mad at her, or judging her. I'll admit I was annoyed by her little manipulation this afternoon, but she was just being Doris Johansson. She doesn't have the luxury of just spitting out her feelings like some of us. Or is it that some of us don't have the luxury of not spitting them out? Yeah, some of us have learned all too well after watching her for a number of years that keeping things in doesn't pay off. After a while, you seem to forget what it was you were hiding and it just stays there, going sour and rotten.

I don't know what is going on here. I am not in denial because I'm not that angry. I am a little angry. No one would blame me, but it's not like I'm walking around thinking about the rough deal I got, and who to blame for it. That's not my style...or is this what Casey means by denial? Is denial where you never think it and never feel it but you have to assume it's there nonetheless? This must be some sort of conspiracy invented by shrinks, then. You could never win, no matter how you protested.

"I'm not in denial," I say out loud. It sounds true.

I put my head down on my knees and close my eyes, just for a second...

And the next thing I know, Casey is shaking me gently. I have actually fallen asleep sitting up. "Mmm..." I say, smacking my lips. I don't like what I am tasting. "Hey...you lived."

"What?"

"You're alive. What time ‘zit?"

"After eleven."

"What took s' long?"

"It was trickier than I expected," Jason admits.

"Hah. Told you."

"Let's go back, I'm really tired."

I'm no longer intoxicated, just exhausted. I stumble home, a trek that seems to take forever this time. Entering through the back door, we find only Mom and Mrs. Garner sitting at the kitchen table.

"Oh," I say. "Everyone left?"

"Yes," Mom says. "I'm just having a cup of tea before bed. What time do you have to leave in the morning?"

"Pretty early. Like...seven."

"I'll get up and make you some breakfast."

Something lances through me, white-hot. It hurts, and it burns and I'm thinking, how can she just announce that she'll get up and make breakfast? Is that the most she can offer? Cooking and tending to a person's bodily needs is no substitute for really caring, hasn't she fucking figured that out at her age?

"You don't have to," I say.

"I'd like to."

"I'll get up too," Jason says. "Well...good night."

"Good night," Casey says. "Thanks for the walk."

"No problem."

Jason descends into the basement, to the room that was once mine and is now his.

"I'm gonna go to bed too," I say, not looking at my mother. If I do, I might start yelling. "Kitten, you want the bathroom?"

"Yes," Casey whispers, and slithers past me and through the kitchen, leaving me — nearly — alone with my mother and her neighbour.

"So did you have a good time?" asks Mrs. Garner.

I think I am intended to feel guilty — well, I don't. We have not actually done anything wrong. In some societies, they make it a ritual to have a big party when someone dies. "Yeah, it was kind of like...a wake."

"Your father would have liked that," my mother comments.

Yeah, he would have at that.

I hear the bathroom door, meaning that I can take my turn, brush my teeth and get to bed. "Well, I'm gonna...turn in."

Maybe my mother has been waiting for the last possible second to say something meaningful to me? If so, this is probably the moment, and I hold my breath.

She says, "Good night."

Right. I am wasting my time here. I hold in place for just one additional moment, then start in the direction of the bathroom. I pause to say, "Will you make sure we're up by six?"

"Sure."

I am perhaps a little more vigourous brushing my teeth than I need to be. Slipping into my pajamas, I pack away all my junk except what I will need in six hours, and go to my couch. Casey is already stretched out on the other, in the half-dark, his chest rising and falling gently. Right now I really wish that we had taken the hotel option, so we would have a bed to share, to cuddle in. Maybe Casey would even listen sympathetically while I rant about my surviving parent.

I have to own up, as I lay there listening to my mother bid her neighbour goodnight, to the brief sounds of puttering in the kitchen and then to preparations for bed — as all the lights in the house are switched off and there is just me, wide awake with my thoughts — I have to own up. I have to own up. I will be leaving within hours here. I have to make sure she knows how I feel.

Okay, let's try this on for size, then: I am pissed. I am really, really pissed.

If this hadn't happened I might not have become pissed, or would have gone on repressing being pissed if indeed I was pissed all along. I just don't know.

I came home after twelve years out of an admirable sense of duty, and she can't bring herself to do more than offer me a place to sit. I think that something more in the way of a gesture is needed, considering that — they kicked me out for being me! I was only sixteen, I was terrified and devastated, and the worst wasn't his reaction, it was hers. He was who he was. He acted accordingly, but her — she went along, even convinced herself it was right because it was what he expected. Or may not, maybe it was her wish too. The thing is, I just don't know. I think she might have let him be the bad guy, said nothing so we could all assume she was just as much a victim as me — oh, hell, I don't know.

So of course, I get almost no sleep again. I don't know how I'm going to just go back to work when I get home, at this rate. I envy Casey, who sleeps as though he hasn't a care, barely moving or making a sound. It's odd — but he used to sleep like that when he was in terrible distress too, just laying down, closing his eyes as though he hoped to never open them. I guess the world is divided between those of us who sleep in times of stress, and those of us who don't.

I am awake when my mom's alarm goes off. I wait until she is in the kitchen and then duck into the bathroom, where I take as long a shower as I dare, trying to simultaneously wake myself and calm myself down. It doesn't work too well.

Shortly after, I arrive in the kitchen, dressed and packed and ready to go. As promised, Mom is standing at the stove making pancakes and bacon. I sit for a moment, but just for a moment. I can't stay still.

"I think I'll load up the car first."

I make it last, going out into the crisp air and loading in my suitcase, collecting the few scraps of garbage that have accumulated over the last day and a half. I am well aware that I am being a coward, and I hate myself. This is not the Sasha Johansson that I know.

When I get back, Casey is up. He is sitting at the table in his sleep sweats, bleary-eyed, staring at the floor, while Mom stands at the stove holding a pancake flipper. Her back is to him.

"Casey," I say quietly. "Why don't you get ready to go?"

He blinks at me, takes in the state of my face, and goes without a word. I take three or four steps, until I am standing next to my mother. She glances up only briefly, then down at the pancake that is beginning to form bubbles around the edges.

"Mom. I have a question for you."

"Yes, Alex?"

She is still looking at the pancake.

"Are you content with your three children or would you like your fourth back?"

She barely moves. Finally, she flips the pancake, revealing one side as a perfect golden-brown. "What do you mean?"

And here I had thought that I couldn't possibly be any more straightforward. "You know what I mean."

"No, I don't."

"Mom, I am quite prepared to walk out that door and never come back. Is that what you want?"

The moment I say it, I feel I have gone too far, pushed her too hard. But that is my stock in trade, isn't it? I don't have the time, nor the patience, for navigating around people's notions of reserve or politeness or denial. I particularly don't have time now.

But she just doesn't speak. She is gazing at the cupboard and not saying a word. I see strain in her, I see that there is emotion there but she can't seem to get it past her lips.

"Mom. What are you doing?"

"I'm cooking breakfast."

"And I'm standing here waiting for an answer to my question."

The pan is smoking. She removes it from the heat and says, "I can't."

"You can't...what? Can't talk? I'm not that scary, Mom...just say it."

She shakes her head.

"For God's sake," I whisper. I hear a sound. I realize that Jason is there, just at the top of the stairs.

"I need to make the pancakes."

"Forget the fucking pancakes," I snarl. "I'm standing right here. I'm here, Mom. Talk to me, tell me something — " I put a hand on her, intending to plead, or maybe force her to face me, to express something, do something. Stand up and be counted, just for once. She pulls away with an almost-grunt, a pitiful little sound.

"Sasha," Jason says. "Please."

I step back. I do not feel hurt so much as impossibly disappointed. I may seem swishy to a lot of people, but let me tell you, I can be as hard as nails. I am not going to cry over this. I was just being as generous as I possibly could, I have given her the chance to —

No. I am not done yet. I made this mistake with my father and my siblings, I am not going to make it again.

"All right," I say. "Mom, if you ever decide you have something to say to me, ask Anna how to contact me." And I head to the door. "Tell Casey I'll be in the car."

"Sasha — "Jason protests.

"Tell him no rush." I lean forward and embrace Jason lightly. "Do you want to write down your email and give it to Casey?"

"Already done." He hugs me back, without reserve. "But Sasha — "

"No, shh. I can't stay here."

Of course, I know it is very unlikely that Casey will want to hang in there for the promise of pancakes. I am counting on it, in fact.

Sure enough, in about ten minutes, Casey is out the door with his suitcase and backpack, his face rather inquisitive but not especially distressed. "Sasha?" he says, breathless.

"I want to leave now. We'll find a place for breakfast. All right?"

He shrugs. "Are you okay?"

"Fine. Did my mother say anything?"

"Um...no. I said thank you and...I'm sorry...about the pancakes. She just nodded."

I shake my head, and I begin to feel just how tired I am. "Here."

Casey looks down — at the keys I am offering. He looks up. "You want me to..."

"Yes. I want you to drive."

"Really?"

"I didn't get any sleep last night."

A grin spreads on his face. He snatches the keys from me and scrambles to the driver's side. I sigh, realizing that I am going to be kept awake by adrenaline now, by watching and worrying. "Stay in the right lane," I command when the car starts to move. "On the highway, I mean...and keep it under sixty."

"Sasha. I've got it under control."

"Hmm."

To my surprise, he does. At least enough that after ten or fifteen minutes, my eyelids grow heavy. "You hungry?" I slur.

"Nah...can wait."

"Me too. When we get to Joneston, maybe...we'll have breakfast then."

"Un-huh."

It is not great sleep; the kind where you constantly feel like you're awake yet somehow the time whips by. It seems barely any time at all before we are pulling into the parking lot of some diner. I straighten, yawning, and meet Casey's questing gaze. "Is

this okay?" he asks, turning off the ignition.

"It looks fine." For all I know, I have eaten here before. It does look busy which is a good sign.

We have what proves to be a very satisfying breakfast. I eat a lot more than I usually would, enjoying the simplicity of eggs and toast, and even ham. There is little conversation, although I sense that Casey is wanting to start it up.

"I can't wait to see Zeke," he says, towards the end of the meal, announcing it almost like it's a surprise to him.

"Well," I remark.

"I didn't think I would."

This saddens me, a little. "You didn't?"

"It's just...I see him every day, and we've only been gone a couple. I thought it would take longer...to miss him."

"You know, kitten, when you're with someone, you don't have to give them first dibs on every second of your time."

"I know."

"Zeke wants to be with you constantly, and that's a little worrying."

"He wants to know what I'm doing is all."

"Like I said...worrying. But he does genuinely like your company." I cant my head slightly. "How do you think he's going to take this plan of yours...to go out and...and see people?"

"I don't plan to tell him."

I sigh. "I've gotten into trouble, keeping secrets from him."

"It's not like he has to know."

I press my lips together.

"Right?"

My eyebrows lower.

"Right?" Casey insists.

"Of course," I allow. "Of course it's your business, Casey. Just — will you take precautions? Don't go to a stranger's house without telling me where you are? Just let me know where you are?"

"That's why I asked for your help in the first place," Casey whispers.

"Oh, kitten. Does this scare you, maybe just a bit?"

"Of course," he snaps. "That's why I have to...and I'm not just scared. I want things..."

I can't help but check if anyone seems to be hearing us. The waitress walks by, refilling my coffee cup. No one seems to be in a hurry. "Tell me again," I beg. "What does Yves think?"

"She doesn't make my decisions."

"I know, but what does she think?"

"She thinks I should be careful, and we should talk about whatever does happen."

"So she hasn't..."

Casey doesn't help me. He just stares, waiting perhaps but not particularly concerned about the prospect of my failing to complete the question. I've been noticing, more and more, this inscrutability in him. He has the ability to suddenly become an absolute stranger — and well, there's more to it, but I lack the ability to put it into words. It's something special, but in a way that makes him go away from me...makes me afraid for him too.

"...she hasn't actually given her opinion as to whether or not sex...is a good idea? Not that you have to tell me, of course."

"Does it matter what she thinks?"

"You're making me a little bit crazy here, kitten. What do you think?"

"I think," Casey answers softly, "that it only matters to you what she thinks because you're assuming she agrees with you."

Something about his tone has me feeling hard-done-by. I snap, "I don't have an opinion."

There was a time when this response from me would have had Casey cowering in abject apology. Instead, he just laughs softly, shaking his head.

I am distinctly annoyed now. "I said I don't have an opinion, and I don't. If she says it's okay, then I believe her."

"It doesn't work like that," Casey insists, now in a fine tremble. "I told you."

We are having a full-fledged fight, which as far as I can remember has never happened before. Oh, I know we've had heated discussions and he has been angry at me, but I have never felt angry towards him. He doesn't know what he's getting into, and he's doing this just to get under my skin. And Zeke's. I really thought he was making progress, that he didn't need to pull this shit anymore.

I'm afraid I'm going to say things that will hurt, so instead I say, "Can I borrow the cell?"

"Yeah, but..."

"What?"

"I doubt there's service here."

"If there was service in Butler Lake there's probably service here."

He shrugs and hands me the phone. I get up from the booth and go into the lobby in between the diner and convenience store, and call Jerry's number.

For the first time in a while, Casey is wrong. Jerry sounds drunk with sleep when he answers.

"Babe, it's me," I say.

"Hey, babe...what's the time?"

"eight something, for you. How late were you up?"

"Till six."

"Oh, hon! What were you doing?"

"A few of us went for drinks after work, then we went to Kwang's after."

"I'm sorry."

"Nah, nah...how's everything?"

"Better, now that I've left that house."

"You're..."

"In Joneston."

"Joneston?"

"It's a little hole-in-the-wall. We're on our way to the airport."

"Already?"

"Yeah, well...I needed to get out of there, Jerry. I couldn't take it."

"What? Take what?"

"I didn't want to eat breakfast there."

There is a pause. Then, "You sound upset."

"Yeah, well, I've just been talking to Casey. He's..." There is a fairly steady traffic here; I decide to step outside, walking away from the building as I talk. "He's got it in his head that he should go out on the town when we get back and get some."

"Really? Like...on a date?"

"No, not a date. Just ‘hook up,' he says. Pick up some schmoe in a club who'll do him in a back alley."

"You told him to be careful, I hope."

"Jerry! Do you not understand what's happening here?"

This time the pause is a little longer, and Jerry's voice is a lot tighter. "No, I guess I don't understand. Why don't you explain it?"

"He's not ready to do this. He's just acting out again and he refuses to tell me what Yves says about it. He probably didn't even tell her! Oh, and the best part is, he wants me to help him!"

"Sasha."

"What?" I growl.

"Why does this bother you so much?"

I can't believe he is being this obtuse. "Why does this bother me? Maybe because I just spent twelve years putting him back together and now he wants to go and let people treat him like shit again! He's going to get hurt, Jerry! I can't let him be hurt again, I can't..."

I can't continue, actually.

"Sasha, baby," Jerry says quietly.

I croak, "What?"

"I don't think you think there's anything wrong with casual sex — casual safe sex. Even for Casey."

"I don't know — "

"What's the matter?"

"Huh?"

"What's bothering you, hon?"

I close my eyes, instantly knowing exactly what it is that's bothering me. I knew all along, really, I just let my misery inflect my conversation with Casey. "Oh, my poor kitten — "

"Casey'll forgive you. People will always forgive you, Sasha, no matter what."

"I think I..."

"You what?"

"My mother."

"Your mother..."

"I tried to get her to say she wanted me in her life, Jerry. I asked her...I just wanted her to say something. She wouldn't."

"Babe...I'm sorry."

"All of this time I've been telling myself she was afraid to stand up to my father...about me... but I think she was just using him as her excuse. She may have loved me...but not enough."

"I'm so sorry."

"Yeah." I swallow the ache in my throat, feeling better just for having spoken about this. After all, I'm more or less back where I thought I started, with no parents. "God, I can't wait to get home."

"I can't wait for you to get home either."

"I still have tomorrow off, too."

"I'm going to give you the full treatment, baby."

"Oh! Guess what — ? I reconnected with my brothers and sister."

"Sasha, that's wonderful."

"Yeah, we're probably going to get together this fall. It's so weird."

"What?"

"You can be a total grown-up, totally together and — like Oliver said, then you get around your family and you become this other person, this asshole."

"I don't follow."

"It was like... suddenly I'm this selfish ass."

"You are not."

"See, that's what I'm talking about."

"Huh?"

"I have to tell Oliver I know what he meant."

"You sound really tired, baby."

"I am. Didn't sleep last night."

"You'll be home soon."

"Zeke was going to come pick us up. Why don't you come with him?"

"Yeah...sounds good."

"Jerry..."

"Yeah."

"I love you."

"Love you too."

"And um, when I get back..."

"What?"

I clear my throat, lower my voice to a hush even though there's no one within ten feet of me. "I want you to fuck me senseless."

"Er...I can do that," Jerry strangles.

"Good," I say brightly, knowing I will be leaving him unsatisfied and impatiently considering the next nine hours of waiting that yawn before him "Now go back to sleep."

"You bitch."

With a laugh, I hang up and go back inside the diner, joining Casey at the table where he is waiting, and with every step I am a little bit closer to being myself. He is sitting over the debris over breakfast, his posture glum. His head jerks up when I reseat myself across from him.

"Hi, kitten."

"Hi," he whispers.

"Um...okay, I'm sorry. I was being unreasonable, and it has nothing to do with you."

He blinks like he wants to believe this, waiting for more reassurance.

"I've been upset about my mother. I had — I guess you could say a confrontation — before we left. It didn't go the way I wanted and I just took it out on you. I'm very, very sorry."

"I'm sorry," he says.

"No, no, no. I'm sorry. I insist that you say you forgive me — or not forgive me if you want. But you are forbidden to say you're sorry again."

A tiny smile is forming on his face. "Okay."

"Okay, what?"

"I forgive you."

I sigh with genuine relief, reaching across to squeeze his hand.

"We had a fight," Casey says, like it's a new flavour he's testing out.

"Yeah, we did. And you know — I have to say, even though I fully admit I overreacted, I'm still concerned."

"I know."

"I mean...you could have just kept it to yourself, why would you tell me if you didn't feel a bit...a bit hesitant maybe?"

"For you to help me."

"Help you with what?"

Casey stares at me, and forces it out: "I'm afraid to go to a bar by myself."

And yeah, I still want to argue, to suggest that if walking in a bar is so tough, then sex should be out of the question — but I know that's not necessarily the case. There are plenty of people who struggle with rudimentary socializing, while being more or less capable of all types of other interaction, including sex...and I am being a stubborn twit.

"Okay," I sigh.

"Okay...like...?"

"I'll help you. And I'm sorry. I'm tired and strung out and upset and none of that has anything to do with you. I'll shut up." I reach across, daring to grope for his hand. "It's just that I don't want you to be hurt."

"I know." Casey blinks hard, full of strained calculation. "Sasha, um...what happened with...with your mom?"

"I asked her a direct question. I should have known better, but I did it anyway and when she just acted like herself, I had to get disappointed."

"Oh."

"And you were right about that river in Egypt."

He doesn't smile. He just waits.

"I'm mad," I explain. "I'm really mad at her and I've been mad for a while."

He ventures, "Not your dad?"

"Not so much. Weird, huh?"

"Emotions are always weird."

I crack a smile. "You don't say."

"Can — can I help?"

"No, kitten. Not really. It's not you — it's just that no one can, you understand? But I'll be fine. I'll talk to Jerry and he'll kiss it better and I'll remember I have him and his family, and you and Zeke, and I have my brothers and sister back, and that's quite a lot." I start to get to my feet. "Shall we?"

He nods, sliding off the end of the booth seat. He still has the keys, and no intention of relinquishing them. I'm still in his hands, more or less, which is just as well.

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