It’s okay, he can learn what I like. Wonder where the bedroom is here? Second floor somewhere. No, my place … no, better a neutral place the first time. Clock ticking. Biological clock. Shit, whatever man came up with that phrase ought to have his balls cut off.

“… important that you share feelings with your friends, with someone close,” she was saying. “Denial can only go on for so long before it turns the pain inward. You’ll promise you’ll call? Talk?”

Bremen lifted his head and nodded. At that second he decided beyond any doubt that the farm could not be sold.

On the fourth day after Gail’s funeral, Bob and Barbara Sutton, neighbors and friends, called again to express their sympathies in private. Barbara wept easily. Bob shifted uneasily in his chair. He was a big man with a blond crew cut, a permanent flush to his round face, and fingers that looked as short and soft as a child’s. He was thinking about getting home in time to watch the Celtics game.

“You know that God doesn’t give us anything we can’t bear, Jerry,” Barbara said between bouts of weeping.

Bremen considered that. Barbara had a premature streak of gray in her dark hair and Bremen followed the sinuous line of it back from her forehead, under her barrette, and out of sight around the curve of her skull. The neurobabble from her was like a surge of superheated air from an open hearth.

Witnessing. Wouldn’t Pastor Miller think it wonderful if I brought this college professor to the Lord. If I quote Scripture, I’m liable to lose him … oh, wouldn’t Darlene have a fit if I came to Wednesday-night services with this agnostic … atheist … whatever he is, ready to come to Christ!

“… He gives us the strength we need when we need it,” Barbara was saying. “Even when we can’t understand these things, there’s a reason. A reason for everything. Gail was called home for some reason the Good Lord will reveal when our time comes.”