Page 109

"I know. I heard the—"

He turned around and stopped.

I'd like the record to show what he looked like, because I had been told about it and hadn't believed it. Gregory hadn't slept either. He was in yesterday's clothes, unshaven, with a piece of paper in his hand.

"Solstice,” he said my name and flinched. "I mean Blaine," he said. "Sorry."

I let it go. I'm not certain why. I'd taken that name away from him in my mother's kitchen when he first arrived, and I had been extremely pleased with myself about it at the time.

"What's that?" I pointed at his hand.

"Nothing."

"Gregory." I very nearly smiled. "What is it?"

He put it behind his back. A grown man in his forties put a piece of paper behind his back like a child hiding a report card.

"Give it to me."

"Blaine—"

"Give me the paper."

He sighed and handed it over.

It was a list, in his handwriting, which slopes and deteriorates toward the bottom of anything. It said things like lead with the film and say yes to Lance first so it isn't about him and don't ask for anything and, underlined twice, DO NOT MENTION THE BOAT.

Then at the bottom, in different ink, as though he'd come back to it later:

If he says no, don't produce a second version.

I was holding my ex-husband's notes for a conversation he was planning to have with me.

"You wrote a script?"

"It's not a script."

"You've got a running order."

"They're notes, Blaine—"

"There are stage directions." I turned it over. "There's a note here that just says hands."

"That's because I do a thing with my hands."

"I'm aware of a number of things you do with your hands."

"Well, I'd have to be aware of it too, wouldn't I, or I'd just—"

He stopped. Then he put both hands flat against his thighs, deliberately, like a man setting down something hot.

"Sit down," I said. "I have to tell you something."

"That's my line."

"It's mine now."

Gregory sat on the end of the bed next to his half-packed bag. I stayed standing, because I could not do this sitting down.