Though Barby hadn’t lived in Corinth since her teenage years, Regina had met her husband-to-be while she and her mother were in Corinth visiting an old friend of Barby’s. Regina had married the boy-I mean, young man-only two months later.

Martin and I had flown up to Pittsburgh for the wedding, maybe seven months ago. We’d gotten the impression that the young couple would be living in very straitened circumstances. Craig Graham had been a dark, lanky no-brainer, whose greatest apparent virtue had been that he cared for Regina. He was eighteen to Regina’s twenty-one. The groom’s share of the wedding duties and expenses had been borne by Barby, who had tried to be unobtrusive about it. Of course, Martin and I had noticed. But Barby had made it clear to us (to Martin, anyway, since she seldom talked to me directly) that after the wedding, the young couple was going to be financially independent, as far as she was concerned. She’d made some pointed remarks about who had made beds and who would be lying in them.

“Would you like a drink? Coffee, or hot chocolate? Though maybe those things aren’t good for the baby.” My friend Lizanne was breast-feeding; and, though I hadn’t asked, she’d generously given me a very thorough grounding on the subject. After being indoctrinated with Lizanne’s opinions on the virtues of, and necessity for, mother’s milk, I was taken aback when Regina gave me a blank look.

“Huh? No, I’m bottle-feeding,” she said, after a pause. “Gosh, if I nursed him, it’d have to be me that fed him every time.”

I kept a smile planted on my face. “So, some coffee?”

“Please.” She slumped back. “I’ve been driving for hours.”

She had driven all the way from Ohio. This was very strange, and getting stranger.