“Yes,” said David. “I was young and stupid and your mother was gorgeous. Those eyes of hers!” He gave a boyish, “Awww, shucks” shrug. “Lucky I did, hey?”

Ellen couldn’t decide whether to be charmed or not.

These were the muddled, imprecise facts of her conception: not quite a great love story, not quite a seedy indiscretion, not quite a brave feminist act.

“Anyway,” said David. “Your mother and I are still friends, and just between you and me, I’m not giving up hope yet.”

“Really?” said Ellen. She wondered if she should tell him that she didn’t think he had a chance at all, but then what did she know? Over the last few months she’d learned that anything she thought she knew to be true could shift and change in an instant. Nothing was permanent: The Buddhists knew what they were talking about.

They sat in silence for a while, watching the preparations for some sort of performance that was obviously about to take place in the center of the marquee.

“Patrick seems like a good man,” said David. “He’s got a son too, hasn’t he? From a previous marriage?”

“Jack,” said Ellen. “He’s at a party today. His mother died when Jack was little.”

“Testing,” said someone over a microphone. “Testing, two, three, four.”

“So obviously the relationship is a bit complicated,” Ellen heard herself say. This was what happened when you talked for too long to a stranger at a bus stop. The conversation suddenly took an inappropriately intimate turn.

“Why?” said David. Ellen was a bit thrown by the question. Wasn’t it self-evident? Most women she knew would have said something like, “Oh, well, yes, of course, I can just imagine, my sister’s friend dated a widower and it was a disaster…”

“I just mean, I guess, that his first wife passed away, and that—”

She was interrupted by a high-pitched shrieking sound from the sound system. Everyone winced and stuck their fingers in their ears.

It finally stopped and someone said, “Apologies!” over the microphone

David said, “I don’t think you’ve got anything to worry about.”

“Why?”

He turned to look at her. “Ellen,” he said. (She thought it might have been the first time he’d used her name, whereas she’d been “David” this and “David,” because she always overused people’s names when she didn’t know them that well.)

“The man was hanging curtains for you this morning.”

“Yes, I know—”

“That’s a mongrel of a job. As my dad would have said.”

“Is it?”

“And he was pretty keen to show me the ultrasound pictures. Doesn’t look like a complicated relationship to me.”

The marquee filled with the sound of a thrumming guitar. Three flamenco dancers stalked onto the stage flicking their gorgeous dresses and tossing their heads, their beautiful young faces fierce and regal.

“Olé!” said Ellen’s father. He lifted his hands above his head and pretended to click imaginary castanets. It was a profoundly dorky dad-like move that would have caused any self-respecting teenage son or daughter to die with shame.

“Olé,” said Ellen agreeably.

She settled back in her chair to watch the dancing, and as she did she felt one last, lingering doubt about Patrick’s love—a doubt she didn’t know she’d had—quietly drift away.

So this was what it was like to have a father.

“Knock, knock?”

It was Tammy’s voice outside my hospital room.

“Don’t mention—” I said to Kate. It wasn’t so much that I thought Tammy would judge me, although of course she would, but that I knew she’d be far too interested, too intrigued and fascinated. She’d gasp and shriek and ask question after question. She’d want to explore my motivations and Patrick’s reactions for hours at a time. She’d never let the topic die.

“Of course not.” Kate put down her knitting. “I won’t even tell Lance.”

She would tell Lance. She would tell him as soon as they got home tonight. There was no way you could keep that sort of secret from your partner.

But I had a feeling that although Lance would think I was one crazy bitch for a while, and he’d be glad he never dated me, and he’d feel sorry for Patrick, in a few years’ time, if Kate happened to bring it up, he’d say vaguely, “Oh, that’s right, what was that story again?” He wasn’t the type to hoard personal information, and I also felt that some sort of innate integrity or morality or dislike of gossip would prevent him from telling people at the office. Anyway, I had a feeling that I wouldn’t be going back to work there. Things were going to change.

“What up, bitches,” said Tammy.

Kate and I rolled our eyes at each other: Tammy and Lance still insisted on trying to talk like Baltimore drug dealers.

Tammy reverted to her normal voice. “Look at you two grandmas with your knitting.”

She tossed a pile of mail on the bed in front of me. “By the way, Janet and Peter said hi.”

“Janet and Peter?” I said blankly.

“Your neighbors,” said Tammy. Ah, the Labrador family from next door. I tried to visualize their faces and couldn’t. Perhaps I’d never really looked at them.

“I went over there for dinner last night,” said Tammy.