Adrian had somewhere to be at eleven and I walked back to the office alone, which was
its own kind of thing. Not sad. Just the specific particular quality of being a person who
has somewhere to be and someone to leave and is entirely fine with both of those facts.
I had been in the office for forty minutes, working through a vendor contract that needed
careful reading, when Lucas appeared in the doorway.
He did not knock. Lucas does not knock. He opens doors with the confidence of a man
who has decided that if he is going somewhere he is welcome there, which in the case of
anywhere I am has been true for thirty-something years and shows no sign of changing.
He came in. He sat down across from me. He put his briefcase on the floor with the
particular deliberateness of a man who has
