Chapter 8: Sunday Dinner

The Lacroix family house sat on the far side of the harbor, on an island you can only reach by water.

We took the 4:30 ferry across on Sunday.

I stood in the middle of the deck with my eyes on a lamppost on the dock.

Gran sat on the bench beside me with her cane across her knees.

"Camp Oyster Point," she said. "The summer of 2004. Do you remember the pond?"

"I remember the smell," I said. "Green. Why?"

"Keep your eyes on the lamppost," Gran said. "I'll tell you Saturday, when I'm sure."

Knox's mother met us at the door with flour on her forearms, and hugged me before I had finished saying hello.

"My son got married on a ferry, in a tuxedo," she said. "I have never been so happy in my life."

"I'm very glad," I said, and found that I was.

The dining room had a table for twelve, and a seating chart on an easel, in four colors of ink.

The head of the table said Knox's mother, then Knox, then Alana.

The foot of it, beside a swinging door marked KITCHEN, said: Vin (plus one).

"Alana did the chart," Knox's mother said. "She does everything."

"She does," I said.

I took a blank place card out of my bag.

It was a spare, and the corner said V.H. SPARE in marker, because I carry them.

I wrote Vin (wife) on it and set it on the table next to Knox's.

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