Chapter 6: Edgemont Street

My father opened the door of the Edgemont Street house before we reached the top step.

He had put on his good flannel.

He had also, I saw, shaved twice, because there was a nick on his jaw with a scrap of tissue on it.

"Dad, this is Sebastian."

"I know who he is."

"Mr. Dacey." Sebastian held out his hand. "Thank you for having me."

Joe looked at the hand.

Then he looked at the bag Sebastian was carrying, which held a bottle of wine and a loaf of bread from a bakery on Passyunk.

"You brought bread," my father said.

"Olivia said you make meatloaf."

"Meatloaf doesn't need bread."

"No, sir. But I thought the gravy might."

My father's mouth did something complicated.

Then he shook Sebastian's hand, hard.

"Come in," he said. "Wipe your feet. The furnace is acting up."

The house was exactly as I had left it that morning and exactly as it had been all my life.

Small rooms, brown carpet, my mother's blue teapot on the radiator and her photograph over the television.

Sebastian stopped in front of the photograph.

"That's my wife," my father said from behind him.

"She has Olivia's smile."

"She had a worse temper."

"I don't believe that."

"Ask her about the time she hit a man with a pie."

"Dad."

"It was lemon," said Joe.

Sebastian laughed, a real one, low and surprised.

I watched my father hear it, and file it away.

We ate in the dining room.

Joe put two helpings of meatloaf on Sebastian's plate without asking, and watched him eat every bite.

"This is very good," Sebastian said.

"My wife's recipe."

"It tastes like it."

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