"You didn't move, though."
"I almost did."
Zoli looked at him sideways. "Yeah, but you didn't." He kicked the can again. "That's the thing. My dad thinks tough is you make the other guy move. But you didn't make anybody move. You just didn't."
Ossie thought about that for a long time afterward. It was the closest thing to a compliment anybody had paid him in about two years.
In return, Ossie told Zoli about Parma. Not much. About the apartment over the dry cleaner's with the radiator that banged. About his father, who sold restaurant equipment and who had gone to Phoenix on a sales trip in 1983 and called from there a month later to say he wasn't coming back, that he'd met someone, that it wasn't anybody's fault. About how his father sent a birthday card every year with a twenty in it and a note that said Hang in there, sport, as if Ossie were on a ledge. About the Timex.
"He left it on the dresser," Ossie said. "I don't know if he forgot it or if he meant to. I never asked."
"You should ask," Zoli said.
"Maybe."
"You won't, though."
"No," Ossie admitted. "Probably not."