‘I’m remembering it. But look, Josie, I didn’t say I was coming.’

‘Oh come on! You agreed!’

‘Like hell I agreed. Anyway, I don’t think your guests will be so pleased.’

‘I’m hosting, so I can invite who I like. And Mom will be great about it. Come on, Rick, we’ve been through this enough. If we’re serious about the plan, we need to do stuff like this together. You’ve got to be able to handle it just as well as me. And why should I have to face that crowd alone?’

‘You won’t be alone. You’ve got your AF now.’

The last two birds had come down. He touched his remote and they all went into sleep mode on the grass.

‘Oh God, I haven’t even introduced you! Rick, this is Klara.’

Rick went on concentrating on his remote and didn’t look my way. ‘You said you’d never get an AF,’ he said.

‘That was a while ago.’

‘You said you’d never get one.’

‘Well, I changed my mind, okay? Anyway, Klara’s not any AF. Hey, Klara, say something to Rick.’

‘You said you’d never get one.’

‘Come on, Rick! We don’t do everything we said when we were small. Why shouldn’t I have an AF?’

She had by now both hands on Rick’s left shoulder, resting her weight there as if trying to make him less tall and the two of them the same height. But Rick seemed not to mind her nearness – in fact he seemed to think it normal – and the idea occurred to me that perhaps, in his own way, this boy was as important to Josie as was the Mother; and that his aims and mine might in some ways be almost parallel, and that I should observe him carefully to understand how he belonged within the pattern of Josie’s life.

‘It’s very nice to meet Rick,’ I said. ‘I wonder if he lives in that neighbor house. It’s strange, but I hadn’t noticed such a house before.’

‘Yeah,’ he said, still not looking directly at me. ‘That’s where I live. My mum and me.’

We then all turned to the view of the houses, and for the first time, I was really able to look at the exterior of Josie’s house. It was slightly smaller, and its roof’s edges a little sharper, but otherwise much as I’d estimated from the inside. The walls had been constructed from carefully overlapping boards which had all been painted a near-white. The house itself was three separate boxes that connected into a single complex shape. Rick’s house was smaller, and not just because it was further away. It too had been built from wooden planks, but its structure was more simple – a single box, taller than it was wide, standing in the grass.

‘I think Rick and Josie must have grown up side by side,’ I said to Rick. ‘Just like your houses.’

He shrugged. ‘Yeah. Side by side.’

‘I think Rick’s accent is English.’

‘Just a little perhaps.’

‘I’m happy Josie has such a good friend. I hope my presence will never come in the way of such a good friendship.’

‘Hope not. But a lot of things come in the way of friendships.’

‘Okay enough now!’ Melania Housekeeper’s voice shouted from the foot of the mound.

‘Coming!’ Josie yelled back. Then she said to Rick: ‘Look, Ricky, I’m not going to enjoy this meeting any more than you. I need you there. You have to come.’

Rick was concentrating again on his remote, and the birds rose together into the air. Josie watched them, both her hands still on his shoulder, so that the two of them formed a single shape against the sky.

‘Okay hurry up!’ Melania Housekeeper shouted. ‘Wind too strong! You want die up there or what?’

‘Okay, coming!’ Then Josie said quietly to Rick: ‘Tuesday lunchtime, okay?’

‘Okay.’

‘Good boy, Ricky. You’ve promised now. And Klara’s a witness.’

Taking her hands from his shoulder, she stepped away. Then grasping my arm, she began to lead us down off the mound.

We descended a different slope from the one we’d climbed, which I saw would bring us down just in front of Josie’s house. Its gradient was steeper, and down below, Melania Housekeeper began to protest, then giving up, hurried around the mound to meet us. As we came down through the cut grass, I glanced back and saw Rick’s figure, once more a silhouette against the sky. He wasn’t looking our way, but up at his birds hovering in the grayness.

After we returned to the house, and Josie had put away her padded jacket, Melania Housekeeper made her a yogurt drink, and the two of us sat together at the Island while she sipped it through a straw.

‘Can’t believe that’s the first time you’ve been outside,’ she said. ‘So what did you think?’

‘I liked it very much. The wind, the acoustics, everything was so interesting.’ Then I added: ‘And of course it was wonderful to meet Rick.’

Josie was pinching her straw close to where it emerged from her drink.

‘I guess he didn’t make such a great impression. He gets awkward sometimes. But he’s a special person. When I get sick and I try to think of good things, I think about all the stuff we’re going to do together. He’s definitely coming to that meeting.’

* * *

—

That evening, as they often did during their supper, they turned down all the lights except those falling directly on the Island itself. I was present, as Josie liked me to be, but wishing to give privacy, stood in the shadows, my face turned to the refrigerator. For several minutes I listened to Josie and the Mother making light-hearted remarks as they ate. Then, still maintaining her light manner, Josie asked:

‘Mom, if my grades are so good, do I really have to host this interaction meeting?’

‘Sure you do, honey. It’s not enough just being clever. You have to get along with others.’

‘I know how to get along with others, Mom. Just not with this crowd.’

‘This crowd happens to be your peer group. And when you get to college, you’ll have to deal with all kinds. By the time I got to college, I’d had years of being alongside other kids each and every day. But for you and your generation, it’s going to be pretty tough unless you put in some work now. The kids who don’t do well in college are always the ones who didn’t attend enough meetings.’

‘College is a long way off, Mom.’

‘Not so long as you think.’ Then the Mother said more gently, ‘Come on, honey. You can introduce Klara to your friends. They’d be excited to meet her.’