It was funny how something inanimate could become the focus of your whole damn day.

Michael Palmer stared at the phone resting on the end of the bar. Standard-issue pub telephone: Scuffed black plastic, cord a snarled mess, a chunk broken out of the handset where it had hit the floor two years ago. Funny thing is, I don't know if I want it to ring or not.

"Dad?"

"Huh?"

"What's a," Billy hesitated, then took the plunge, "tay-vurn?"

"Tav-ern."

"What's a tavern?"

"I'll give you a hint. You're sitting in one."

Billy glanced down. "A stool?"

"Not on one. In one."

His son looked at him, looked around, then smiled like a burst of sunlight. "A bar?"

"Bingo."

Billy gave a little nod like he'd known all along, he'd just been asking to test his father, then returned to the newspaper spread out on the counter. Eight-year-old fingers choked all the way down the base of the pencil as he scratched the letters. As he hunched over to read the next clue, his lips mouthed the words. His mother had been the same way. Michael used to find Lisa in bed with a novel, lips moving as though reciting a spell. How many nights had he stood in the doorway and watched her, just watched, entranced by the rise and fall of her breath, the curve of her shoulder, the smiles and frowns she gave her secret world?

He shook his head to clear the memory, counted how long since the last time he'd thought of her. Pretty good – not since lunch yesterday. Peanut butter and bananas cooked up like a grilled cheese, crunchy outside, gooey in. Lisa had always called it "De Elvis Especial," saying it in a bad Latin accent, and that was how Billy asked for it now, though Michael doubted he remembered much of his mother but auburn hair and love.