"I wish I could make a better defence of my conduct, but I haven't any. Men are fools — schmucks, if you prefer — at least this one is. We need reconfirmation of our charms — more so the older we get. All I can add is I wish the entire thing never happened. Love affair, confrontation with husband, the hitman, jail, loss of my family, the whole thing. I thank God that the guy I hired didn't get the job done, or I would also have a murder on my conscience."

"So what do you want from me?" I asked.

"I want you to know that I am deeply ashamed and profoundly sorry. I'm sorriest of all for what I did to your mother. I ruined her life. I know that. I'm sorry, too, for what I did to Lee and you. Lee has made a life for himself despite his father's folly. But I think the effect of what I did has hit you harder than it has him. I wish I could undo that, but I realise that of course I can't."

"So what do you want from me?" I said.

"Don't you see I'm throwing myself on the mercy of the court? The best thing that can happen to me right now is to have you make more of a life for yourself. Find a good man, maybe have a child. Live a fuller life than the one my stupidity seems to have forced you into." His eyes were watery. He reached out across the table to touch my hand, which I withdrew.

I can't tell you what else we talked about during the rest of lunch. I can't recall even if I ate another bite from my omelette. Outside, on the sidewalk on Broadway, he asked if I drove. I said I did but didn't offer him a ride back to the Belden-Stratford. He said he hoped I would think about what he had said. I told him I would, but of course I already had. We were supposed to have hugged, in the manner of the day, perhaps exchanged kisses on the cheek, but we did neither. I watched him turn east off Broadway at the corner of Barry Street.

I continued to see Lee, Angie, and the kids, but I began to find excuses for missing holiday dinners at which I knew I would find my father. I hadn't forgiven him. Life would have been a lot easier all round if I could have done, but I couldn't.

At first we thought my mother's weakness may have been owing to her diabetes. Then a CAT-scan made plain that it was liver cancer, fairly far advanced. She had a single round of chemotherapy, which exhausted her utterly, causing the loss of her beautiful auburn hair. She decided to forego a second round of chemo. Lee suggested that she join a support group for people with terminal cancer. She politely told him that she didn't think it was for her. "I'm depressed enough on my own as it is," she told me, "without having to hear other people's sob stories."

Lee asked my mother's permission to tell our father about her cancer. She told him that it was all right to do so, but not to let him know that she had refused further chemo. "I don't want him hovering over me," she said, "trying with his lawyerly logic to change my mind."

I came home from school one afternoon just after my father had left our apartment on Washtenaw.