Chapter 18: Room Four

We walked to the Blue Heron without touching.

He kept the outside of the sidewalk, toward the street, and the wind came between us.

Light leaked from the curtains of room six, and a Vikings game murmured behind them.

My mother had not gone to the gala.

She had said she would rather eat glass, and I could hear her now, shouting at a referee.

Room four was two doors down.

Knox opened it and stood aside, and I went in.

Three boxes of books stood against the wall, and a lamp on the floor was plugged into the only outlet.

There was a bed with a brown spread, a chair, and a window that did not close all the way.

It was the smallest room I had ever been in with him.

"I'm sorry about the room," he said.

"Stop apologizing for furniture."

He almost smiled, and then did not.

He sat down on the edge of the bed with his elbows on his knees.

"I should say this," he said. "Before you say anything."

"Say it."

"I know what you want."

I stood in my coat in the middle of the carpet.

"You want N.W.," he said. "You carried him for two years. I'd carry him too, if I could."

"Knox."

"He was better than me. He had one job, which was to say true things in the margin."

"Face to face, I'm a man who watched you kiss my brother and went for coffee."

He looked at his hands.

"I understand if you take the notes and leave the rest."

I looked at him for a long moment, at the dark head bent over his hands.

He truly believed the best part of him was a stack of paper.

"Hold out your hand," I said.

"Which?"

"The left."

He held it out.

I took the folded note from my coat pocket, the one soft at its creases, and laid it across his palm.

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