As soon as I got out of the car, they all came bounding over to me, their tongues hanging out, tails wagging. I nearly held up a palm to ward them off.

“Do you want to come over to our place this afternoon?” asked the little girl.

“Give Saskia a minute,” said the mother, all loving laughter. She’s at least fifteen years younger than me. Maybe more. I had no memory of her name. I hadn’t even bothered to register it.

They wanted to know if I would like to come over for a “housewarming barbecue” that afternoon.

“Just a few friends,” said the mother. “Just very casual.”

“The next-door neighbor at our last house was called Mrs. Short,” the little boy told me. “But she actually wasn’t short. She was actually pretty tall.”

“Huh,” I said.

The boy reminded me a little of Jack, something about the eyes maybe. Or perhaps it’s just the age. He looks about five, the same age as Jack was when Patrick and I broke up. I didn’t want to make friends with him. Just looking at him made my chest hurt.

“Or even if you just wanted to stop by for a quick drink,” suggested the father.

“We’ve got special sausages,” said the little girl. “They’ve got chili in them.”

“No pressure, don’t feel obligated!” said the mother. “We just thought—you know, if you didn’t have anything else on, seeing as we’re sort of sharing a house, we’ve never lived in a duplex before, so we thought—but of course, you probably have other plans, or you might prefer to just relax on a Sunday.”

She stopped, a little flustered. I saw her husband give her a look. They could sense my resistance and they were giving me a way out. They’re nice. Nice, polite, ordinary people. That’s all I need. To be living next door to nice people. They make me feel so inferior.

So much for my day at home sedating myself with television. I told them I would have loved to join them but I had another commitment that would take up most of the day.

I overdid it with my regrets. I shouldn’t have acted at all regretful.

“Another time!” said the father.

“Another time!” said the mother.

“Another time!” said I.

“Another time!” said the little boy, and we all laughed oh so heartily, and the poor kid frowned because, after all, why was it funny when he said it?

So, fabulous. Now there will be another time.

I went inside and spent quite a lot of time preparing for my fake social obligation. I decided I was going to an old friend’s fortieth birthday party. It was just a casual but elegant event in her backyard. There would be lots of kids running about, and she was having it catered—I decided she was a well-off friend; in fact, her house actually backed on to the harbor—so the food would be good. I would be doing a speech! It would be funny and sentimental. The sort of speech that Ellen would do at a friend’s fortieth birthday party.

I dressed in jeans, boots, a really beautiful blue top that Tammy had bought me for my birthday just before Mum died, that I’d never found the right occasion to wear—a fortieth birthday by the harbor, perfect!—and a long scarf that Mum had made for me. I knew that everyone at the party would compliment me on the scarf. My mother was very talented, I would tell them. I even blow-dried my hair and put on makeup and a pair of big earrings that Patrick always said made me look sexy.

By the time I walked out the door I was feeling the most attractive I’d felt in a long time.

On impulse I grabbed together the ingredients I’d bought for the Anzac biscuits and put them in a plastic bag. I decided I would drop them off at Ellen’s front door on my way to the party. She could make biscuits; I was too busy with my active social life.

As I walked to my car, a man and woman were walking up the driveway toward the neighbor’s house for the housewarming barbecue. The man was holding a bottle of wine and the woman was carrying a large plate wrapped in aluminum foil.

I smiled at them and said, “Hi!” as if I was a person too, a person off to a fortieth birthday party on a Sunday.

They smiled back. In fact, the man’s smile seemed especially friendly, not at all perfunctory, almost like he knew me and was trying to place me, or almost as if—could it be?—he found me attractive.

“Coming over to the party?” he said.

“No, I’ve got another one to go to,” I said. “A fortieth.”

“Oh, well, have fun!” he said, at the same time as the neighbor’s front door was opening and the next-door neighbors came out crying, “Look who’s here!” and “So you found us OK?”

I went to my car quickly, before they felt they had to introduce me. There was none of this awkwardness when Jeff lived next door; neither of us ever had anyone over. As I turned on the ignition and waved good-bye, I saw the man was still watching me. He lifted his hand to wave good-bye and I felt a warm feeling, like the way I remembered happiness felt.

I reversed out onto the street and glanced back, smiling, ready to wave again if someone caught my eye, and saw that none of them were looking at me. The woman was handing over the aluminum-wrapped plate, and as she did I saw the man pulling her toward him, his hand on her hip in the same mock-masterful way that Patrick used to do, and she was laughing up at him, and the little boy from next door was pulling at his free hand, wanting to point something out to him.

The warm feeling vanished.

He hadn’t found me attractive at all. He was just one of those nice, friendly people who liked everyone. It made sense. The nice people next door would know other nice people. They tend to congregate.