Last year I’d found her a job at the Honda dealership where I work, just this side of that same river here in Milford. While there were moments when we wanted to kill each other, overall it had been a pretty good experience sharing digs. This year, however, Sydney had opted not to work at the dealership. Living with me was enough. Having me keep an eye on her while she worked was something else again.

“Have you noticed,” she’d asked me last year, “that every guy around here I talk to, even for a minute, you tell me something bad about him?”

“It’s good to be forewarned,” I’d said.

“What about Dwayne, in Service?” she’d said. “His rag was too oily?”

“Sign of bad character,” I’d said.

“And Andy?”

“You’re joking,” I’d said. “Way too old. Mid-twenties.”

So this year she’d found a different job, but still here in Milford, so she could live with me from June through Labor Day. She’d gotten herself hired at the Just Inn Time, a hotel that catered to business travelers only looking to stay a night or two. Milford ’s a nice place, but it’s not exactly a tourist destination. The hotel had been a Days Inn or a Holiday Inn or a Comfort Inn in a previous life, but whichever conglomerate had owned it, they’d bailed, and an independent had come in.

I wasn’t surprised when Sydney told me they’d put her on the front desk. “You’re bright, charming, courteous-”

“I’m also one of the few there who speaks English,” she’d countered, putting her proud father in his place.

It was like pulling teeth, getting her to talk about the new job. “It’s just work,” she’d say. Three days into it I heard her arguing on the phone with her friend Patty Swain, saying she was going to look for something else, even if she was making good money, since no income tax was being taken out.