An old boyfriend came courting. I was standing in Grandma’s breezeway, looking out over the yard, and he came walking down the side street from the cemetery. Everything was still and overcast, humid, as if there might be a storm.

He looked as I remembered, the one time I’ve seen him since high school: middle-aged heaviness, hair long and curly. He was wearing weird round little glasses, as if trying to resemble James Joyce.