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Evie looked slightly puzzled. “No,” she said.

—

After Evie was asleep, Artie came downstairs and sat by the lit Christmas tree. He went over in his mind his conversations with Ken. No, they had never discussed politics directly, they had—he thought—mentioned the terrible stuff in the Middle East and Ukraine. As Artie slowly recalled these memories, it came to him that it did not (really) matter to him that Ken supported the next president (except that it did). Mostly Artie was surprised. He felt the old sadness of what (he thought) was going to happen to the country. And he was surprised at how different people could be. Ken was the opposite of an evil person, and yet the country was headed in a terrible direction, Artie was certain of this. But Ken—and Artie shook his head slowly—was such a good and decent man. Artie thought: I love him. And it was true; a warmth spread through Artie as he realized this. He sat for many minutes as he absorbed this.

He thought then how he had told Ken that maybe he was going to tell Evie during this Christmas vacation that he knew about Rob’s father. But he had not told Evie; they had just had Christmas together for the thirty-fifth time; let it go, he had thought, I’m not going to do that. He wondered now if Evie would feel better if it was no longer a secret? And Artie realized that he did not know. He did not know Evie well enough to know if she had lived with this so long that it had become a part of her fabric and that to have it ripped off would destabilize her. Or if in fact she would be hugely relieved. He just did not know.

—

The house was silent.

—

As Artie sat there looking at (but not really seeing) the lit Christmas tree, he had a sense of time rushing over him. Oddly, he pictured himself climbing those steep blue stairs by the school, the ones that led down to the public basketball court, and how his heart had banged hard when he’d last walked up them, after speaking to Flossie. He thought—without particular concern—that he might never walk up them again. (He was right, he would not.)

He thought about Rob and Francesca, that they were embarked now on their own life. And he did not want to weigh them down, he would not ever call his son, as his poor father had done, and say, “I’m feeling kind of depressed.” (He would, in fact, do that.)

And then he thought about Ken Moynihan again, what a good man he was. A man to whom Artie had spontaneously told the secret of his son. But he thought he would be careful now with Ken; they would just never talk about politics, that’s all. Nobody was talking about it these days if you didn’t know whose side the other person was on. Everything, Artie sat forward as he realized this, everything in the world seemed to him to be filled with unspoken truths. Evelyn Peabody trying to kill herself. Artie himself having thought about such a thing for those few months. All the things in the world that people did not know about one another. Even those very close to them.

It was not anybody’s fault. He thought this. Not really. Poor Maria eating that confectionary sugar. That had been a secret.

His own recent attempt at shoplifting. That was a secret.

He stood up.

As he walked slowly up to the bedroom, he thought that now, after all these years, he was finally becoming a grownup. What did he mean by that? That he was finally beginning to understand the multitudinous aspect of people. He was amazed by it, really, now that he thought about it. In his study of history, he had learned about the leaders, and the various groups involved, but he had somehow missed this fact about every single person: that they held within themselves a vast, unknowable universe.

And he understood that it could make a person lonely; people had to take and give to one another whatever they could. If it was not enough…Well, then it meant one just had to be a grownup.

—

(About free will, Artie did not think all that much anymore. He was—and he only vaguely understood this—beginning to get tired.)

As Artie pulled into the parking lot of Spud’s on the first evening of January, it was dark and raining and very windy. He heard a text come in and it was Flossie: I’m here!!! When Artie got out of his car he ducked through the rain; it was too windy to open an umbrella, and the surf was so strong that it almost came over the railing by the door. Just as Artie was about to go inside, he had a sudden flash of understanding: This will be hard.

Inside, the tiny lights on the tables gave a glow to the white tablecloths; there were more people than Artie would have thought. He looked around as the hostess stepped up to him. But there she was, dear Flossie. Her hair was not as yellow as it had been, he almost did not know who she was except for the sound of her voice: “Artie!” She held out her arms in her dark tweed winter coat as she walked toward him, and he gave her a hug. From the moment she clung to him, he thought—in some way he thought this—this is going to be more than hard, it is all going to be false. Spud came out of the kitchen and said, “Flossie! You’re back!”

“Hello, Spud!” And Flossie gave him a hug as well.

“You two enjoy yourselves, nice to see you back here, Flossie.” And Spud returned to the kitchen.

—

Flossie said, “Artie, what do you think of my new glasses?” She was wearing huge, square, red-framed glasses, and he told her that he thought they were just great. But as he followed her to the table and sat down across from her, it went through his mind that she looked slightly crazy. “Flossie,” he said, shaking his head. “Artie!” she said, putting her hand over his. “Tell me how you are”: They both said this at the same time, which caused Flossie to start laughing. Her large full chest shook as she laughed, and her big red glasses seemed to magnify her eyes and therefore the black circles she had drawn around them.

Flossie said, “So Evie is okay?”

And Artie said that she was.

“Good,” Flossie said. “Now let’s enjoy ourselves.” And this made her laugh again.

“You first.” He nodded at her. And she let out a huge sigh that made her cheeks swell, and she said, “Oh Artie, what was I thinking when I went out there? Sophie cannot stand me—” And Flossie talked on about her lonely days, how sometimes she did not get dressed at all, but that she had found on television a show where men knitted and that was soothing to her.

“They knit?” Artie said.

She nodded. “It’s really a lovely show.”

“They’re knitting?” Artie asked again, and she said, Yes, it was very soothing to watch. She shook her napkin into her lap and said, “But you! Artie, you went and practically drowned yourself! How in the world did that happen?”