“Megan?” His face lit up like a Christmas tree. “How was the trip?”

“Not bad.” She sounded happy to hear him, too, and faintly embarrassed to have been the one to call. But she didn't give a damn. She had suddenly been so lonely for him once she arrived in Boston again, that she had had an irresistible urge to reach out to him. “It's always strange coming home again at first. It's as though they forget we're grown up, and they start ordering you around like a kid. I always forget that till I come home again.” He laughed, he always felt the same way. And he still remembered how odd he and Liz had felt staying in his old room. It was like being fourteen years old again, and sex was taboo. He preferred staying at a hotel, but with the kids there was no point. And they had come to share the holidays with their grandparents. In some ways it was less lonely here, with them, than staying at a hotel, but he knew exactly what Megan meant.

“I know exactly what you mean. It's like taking a step back in time and proving they were right all along. You are fourteen years old, and you've come back to do it their way this time …except you don't. And eventually everyone gets pissed at you.”

She laughed. In Boston, they already were. Her father had gone to do a delivery an hour after she arrived, and she hadn't wanted to go with him because she was tired, and he had left, obviously annoyed at her, while her mother had scolded her for not bringing boots that were warm enough, and folding everything in her suitcase wrong. And an hour after that, she had chided her for leaving her room a mess. It was difficult after eighteen years of living alone, to say the least. “My brother said he'd rescue me tonight. They're having a dinner party at their house.”

“Will that be Boston sedate, or completely nuts?”

“Probably both, knowing them. He'll probably get completely drunk, and someone else will take off all their clothes, probably some Jungian analyst who gets gassed on his lethal punch. He loves doing things like that.”

“Watch out he doesn't get you.” It was strange thinking of her in that milieu, and lonely for him. He realized how much he missed her suddenly, and he wasn't sure if he could say that to her. It seemed inappropriate in their friendship somehow, and yet there was more to it than that, and there was a great deal to be explored. “Are you coming to that wedding down here?” He was counting on it, but didn't tell her so.

“It looks like they are anyway. I'm not sure what my parents will say about my going away when I'm supposed to be visiting them, but I thought I'd mention it and see what they say.”

“I hope they let you come.” He looked like a worried teenager, and suddenly they both laughed. It was the fourteen-year-old syndrome again.

“See what I mean!”

“Listen, just come for one night, it would be fun seeing you here.”

She didn't disagree with him, and she wanted to see him very much. He had been on her mind for weeks, and she was sorry she hadn't seen him again before they both left for the east, but they both led busy lives, with a great many responsibilities. And maybe getting together in New York wasn't such a bad idea. “I'll see what I can do. It would be fun.” And then she had a better idea. She sounded like a kid as she suggested it to him. “Do you want to come to the wedding with me?” She loved the idea the more she thought of it. “Did you bring a dinner jacket to New York?”

“No, but I know a great store.” They both laughed. “Are you sure it's appropriate since I don't know the bride and groom?” A wedding at the Colony Club sounded like a very serious affair to him, and the very thought of it intimidated him, but Megan laughed at the thought.

“Everyone will be so drunk they won't give a damn who you are. And we can slip away early and go somewhere else …like the Carlyle to listen to Bobby Short.” He fell silent as he listened to her words. That was one of his favorite things to do in New York, and Bobby was an old friend from his New York days. He had been following him for years.

“I'd love that.” His voice sounded husky, as he thought of her, and he felt young again, as though life were beginning for him, and not as though it had already begun, and ended in tragedy less than two years before. “Try and come down, Meg.”

“I will.” There was an urgency between them now, and in a way it almost frightened her, and yet she wanted to see him while she was there. She didn't want to wait until they met in Napa again. “I'll do my best. And put the twenty-sixth on your calendar. I'll come in that morning, and stay at the Carlyle. My crazy brother always stays there.”

“I'll pick up a dinner jacket at the store this week.” It all sounded like fun, except the wedding itself, which he was dreading a little bit. It was only three days before his anniversary with Liz. It would have been four years. But he couldn't think of that now. He couldn't go on celebrating anniversaries that didn't exist, and suddenly he wanted to reach out to Megan, as though to force the memories from his head, and she heard something odd in his voice and was suddenly worried about him. It was as though she knew him better than she did. It was odd the communication they had. They had both noticed it.

“Are you all right?” Her voice was soft from her end, and he nodded with a tired smile.

“I'm okay. The ghosts get me sometimes …particularly at this time of year.”

“It's hard for everyone.” She had gone through it too, but it had been such a long time, and there had usually been some man or other in her life at this time of year. Either that or she was at the hospital, on call with sick kids. Either way, she suffered less than she knew he would. She hoped his family would be good to him. She knew how difficult the holidays would be for him, and the kids, or Jane anyway. “How's she?”

“Happy to be here. She and my mother are as thick as thieves. They've already got plans for the next three weeks, and Nanny is staying on here with them after I leave. I've got to be back in San Francisco for a meeting on the thirtieth, and Jane doesn't have to be back in school till the tenth, so that gives them two more weeks after I leave, and they're all looking forward to it.” She wondered if he'd be lonely then.

“Will you come up to Napa while they're gone?”

“I might.” There was a long silence as they shared the same thoughts and then shied away from them again, and she promised to call him by the end of the week, to tell him her plans. But the next time he called her. It was two days after they had arrived in New York, and it was Christmas Day, and her father answered the phone in a booming voice and called out to her, telling her to hurry up.

She came scurrying to the phone breathlessly, and Bernie smiled the moment he heard her voice. “Merry Christmas, Meg.” He had fallen into calling her that, and she smiled. No one had called her that since her best friend when she was a child, and it warmed her heart when he did it.

“Merry Christmas to you too.” She was happy to hear his voice, but there seemed to be a lot of noise in the background, and someone was calling her.

“Is this a bad time?”

“No. We were just leaving for church. Can I call you back?” And when she did, she announced herself to his mother as Doctor Jones again. They had a nice long chat, and when he hung up the phone, his mother eyed him curiously. The children were in their room, playing with some of their presents with Nanny Pip. They had gotten most of their gifts for Chanukah, but Grandma Ruth couldn't forgo Christmas entirely. She didn't want to disappoint Alex and Jane, so Santa Claus now came to their house too, which made Bernie laugh. If he had wanted to celebrate Christmas as a child, they would have been horrified. But for their grandchildren, even that was all right. They had mellowed a lot over the years. But not totally.

“Who was that?” His mother attempted unsuccessfully to look naive, after his call from Meg.

“Just a friend.” It was a game that was familiar to him, although he hadn't played it with her in a long, long time, and he was secretly amused by it.

“Anyone I know?”

“I don't think so, Mom.”

“What's her name?”

He used to balk at that, but he didn't care anymore. He had nothing to hide, even from her. “Megan Jones.” She looked at him, half pleased that someone had called, half angry because her name wasn't Rachel Schwartz.

“Another one of those again.” But secretly she was pleased. There was a woman calling him. He was alive again. And there was something in his eyes which almost gave her hope. She had said as much to Lou the night he arrived, but Lou said he didn't see anything different in him. He never did. But Ruth did. And she saw it now. “How come you never meet Jewish girls?” It was a question as much as a complaint and this time he grinned at her.

“I guess 'cause I don't go to temple anymore.”

She nodded, and then wondered if he was angry at God because of Liz, but she didn't want to ask him that, which was just as well. “What kind is this?” There were long pauses between her questions and Bernie smiled at her.

“Episcopalian.” He remembered the scene at Cote Basque and so did she.

“Oy” But it was a small unedited word, more of a statement of fact than a warning of collapse. “An Episcopalian. Is it serious?”

He was quick to shake his head and she wondered about that. “No, it's not. She's just a friend.”

“She calls you a lot.”

“That makes twice.” And she knew he had called her too, but she didn't say that to him.

“Is she nice? Does she like the kids?” A double-barreled question this time, and he decided to say something on Meg's behalf, to assure her of his mother's respect at least.