I had booked a room at the Lombard Hotel downtown, a small extravagance for a birthday that was becoming smaller by the hour.

Brenda had promised to meet me there for dinner.

I decided I would stay even if she canceled.

By two that afternoon, she was sitting in the armchair in room 214 with her winter coat still buttoned.

“The kids have soccer practice, and Dave has that meeting in Lansing that he absolutely cannot miss, Mom.”

She took off her glasses and polished them with her cardigan sleeve.

Brenda was thirty-six, capable, hurried, and always surrounded by the loose ends of other people’s schedules.