It was ninety-four degrees, which in Cholla Springs at the end of September counts as mercy. Nico asked if he could go, and I said yes, and then I sat on the bench by the gate for two hours with a paperback I didn't read, watching him swim laps, watching him dive, watching him float on his back with his eyes closed and his arms out like a starfish, breathing. Just breathing. In and out, without a whistle at the end.
Everett Hollister came home from a rehabilitation facility in mid-September. He has a portable oxygen concentrator now that he uses at night and on hot afternoons, a little gray box on a shoulder strap, and he walks more slowly than he did. The neighborhood watched him come home without saying much. Some people waved. Some people didn't know whether they were allowed to.
I didn't go over. I didn't know whether I was allowed to, either.
Then, on the first Sunday in October, I did. I'm not entirely sure why. Maybe because Glynis had said she wouldn't come back unless I asked, and she'd kept her word for two months, and somebody had to go first. I put my phone in the pocket of my jeans and walked down Mariposa Lane and rang the bell of a house that was the same model as mine in a color called Desert Dove.
Glynis opened the door. She saw it was me and didn't speak. Behind her, in the living room, Everett was in a recliner with a Diamondbacks game on the television and the oxygen tube looped over his ears. He looked up.
"I know you," he said. "You're the lady with the orange tree."
"That's right," I said. "Mireya."
"You pulled me out," he said. "Glyn told me. I don't remember it." He frowned at the television. "I don't remember a lot of things. Did they get the feeder fixed?"
"They did," I said. "It's a good one. New fan too."
"About time," said Everett, satisfied, and turned back to the game.