“He had a high, shiny forehead,” Farrell said, “and I used to call him Rubberlips.” Sia began to laugh very quietly. Her laughter was almost too low for him to hear; it played at the edges of all his senses, like whale song. Farrell went on. “He was a hell of a swimmer, a really rotten actor, and in high school he got me through trigonometry one year and chemistry another. I used to make faces at him in math class, trying to get him to laugh. His father died, I think when we were juniors. He hated my plaid winter hat with the earflaps, and he loved Judy Garland and Joe Williams and little nightclubs where they’d put on a show with five people. That’s the kind of stuff I remember, Sia. I didn’t know him. I think he knew me, but I was too busy worrying about my pimples.”

She continued to smile, but the expression, like her laughter, seemed a part of some other, slower language, where everything he understood meant something else. She said, “But you had a room together, later, when you lived in New York. You would play music together, and nothing is closer than that. You see, I am jealous of anyone who was before me, like God. I can be jealous of his mother and his father sometimes.”

Farrell shook his head. “No, you aren’t. I’m reasonably stupid, but you’re playing with me. Jealousy is not your problem.”

“Get down, Briseis,” Sia said sharply. The Alsatian left Farrell and trotted clicking to her. Sia fondled the dog’s muzzle, never taking her glance from Farrell.

“No,” she said. “I am not jealous of anything you know about him, or anything you may have of him. I am only afraid of what comes with you.” Farrell found himself turning solemnly, so truly did she seem to see the sullen companion at his shoulder. Sia said, “Being young. He forgets how young he is—there’s nothing like a university to make you do that. I never try to make him old, never, but I let him forget.”

“Ben was always a little old,” Farrell said. “Even shooting paper clips in home room. I think you must be younger than Ben.”