Chapter 20: Day Thirty

Day thirty fell on a Saturday, and I dressed for it as I would for a hearing.

I wore the navy suit, and I put the terms in a plastic sleeve.

They were on the back of a ferry schedule, in two kinds of handwriting, folded twice, soft at the creases.

At six I sat down at the little table by the window.

It was term four, dinner together, and Knox had cooked.

He set down two plates of shrimp and grits, and sat across from me with his hands on either side of his fork.

"Day thirty," he said.

"I'd like to call this meeting to order."

"Is there an agenda?"

"There's a motion," I said.

I unfolded the schedule on the tablecloth and smoothed it flat.

The terms ran down the back, in my block capitals and his blocky ones.

At the bottom, in pencil, in my own writing, was a line I did not remember writing.

DAY 30. DECIDE.

And under it, in smaller pencil, in his: Already did.

I looked up.

"I wrote that the first night," Knox said. "You were asleep. I was sitting on the floor with the schedule on my knee."

"You never said."

"It said not to read until day thirty."

"Term two," I said.

"Broke it myself, Monday, in a storm."

"Term three."

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