Her name’s Vicki.” Vicki swings her smiling head around and holds up a glass of champagne to toast me.

“Bring her out here, I’ll meet her. What a name. Vicki.”

“Another visit, Henry. We’re on a short schedule this time.” Vicki goes back to watching the night fall.

“I don’t blame you,” Henry says brashly. “You know, Frank, sometimes the fact of living with somebody makes living with them impossible. Irma and I were just like that. I sent her to California one January, and that was twenty years ago. She’s a lot happier. So you stay down there with Vicki whatever.”

“It’s hard to know another person. I admit that.”

“You’re better off assuming anybody’ll do anything, anytime, than that they won’t. That way you’re safe. Even my own daughter.”

“I wish I could come out there and get drunk with you, Henry, that’s the truth. I’m glad we’re pals. Irma told me to tell you she’d seen a real good performance of The Fantasticks in Mission Viejo. And it made her think of you.”

“Irma did?” Henry says. “What’s the fantastics?”

“It’s a play.”

“Well, that’s good then, isn’t it?”

“Any messages to go back? I’ll probably write her next week. She sent me a birthday card. I could add something.”

“I never really knew Irma, Frank. Isn’t that something?”

“You were pretty busy making a living, though, Henry.”

“She could’ve had boyfriends and I wouldn’t have even noticed. I hope she did. I certainly did. All I wanted.”

“I wouldn’t worry about that. Irma’s happy. She’s seventy years old.”

“In July.”

“What about a message. Anything you want to say?”

“Tell her I have bladder cancer.”

“Is that true?”

“I will have, if I don’t have something else first. Who cares anyway?”

“I care. You have to think of something else, or I’ll think of something for you.”

“How’s Paul and how’s Clarissa?”

“They’re fine. We’re taking a car trip around Lake Erie this summer. And we’ll be stopping to see you. They’re already talking about it.”

“We’ll go up to the U.P.”

“There might not be time for that.” (I hope not.) “They just want to see you.