Robert there somehow.
Jonathan arrived in an old blue pickup.
He was tall.
Thin.
Silver-haired.
Daniel stood on the porch staring at him.
Neither moved.
Then Jonathan smiled.
And suddenly I saw it.
Daniel’s smile.
Not Robert’s.
Not Samuel’s.
Jonathan’s.
Daniel saw it too.
His entire face changed.
Jonathan climbed the steps.
“I had a speech,” he said.
Daniel laughed nervously.
“So did I.”
“Forgot mine.”
“Me too.”
They stood there awkwardly.
Two strangers connected by forty-seven missing years.
Then Jonathan opened his arms.
Daniel stepped into them.
I turned away because some moments belong to the people inside them.
Claire and Michael arrived later that afternoon.
They brought food.
Too much food.
Claire brought wine.
Michael brought a cake that said:
HAPPY 62ND + 2 DAYS, MOM
I stared at it.
“You couldn’t just write happy birthday?”
“The bakery charged by the letter.”
“That makes your decision worse.”
