Blinded by Stephen White Page B

heart, figuratively, that was slowing his progress across the wide lawn.
    We spoke little until we got to his door. I went inside with him to use his bathroom before I drove the short way back to my office.
    When I’d finished washing my hands, I stepped into his tiny kitchen to say good-bye. He was slumped over at the counter with his head in his hands.
    “Sam? You okay?”
    He didn’t look up. With his elbow he slid a single sheet of floral paper in my direction. I could see it was covered in a tiny, neat script.
    He said, “It looks like Sherry’s gone. She took Simon to see his grandparents.”
    “For Thanksgiving? In Minnesota?”
    He looked up, finally. His eyes were red. “I guess. I imagine I’ll be alone for the holidays.”
    “What does it say? You guys haven’t talked about this?”
    “Talking’s overrated. I think she’s taking a break from me.”
    “Sherry’s leaving you?”
    He picked up the paper and shoved it into his pocket. “I don’t know. Maybe.”
    The shock I felt was seismic. I couldn’t imagine the effect of the quake on Sam’s recovery.
    “She loves me. That’s not it, Alan. I’m not a hundred percent sure what it is, but it isn’t that.”
    “Sam, I-”
    “Go back to work. I think I want to be by myself for a while,” he said.
    My feet were stuck to the linoleum.
    “Go on. I need the practice,” he said.
    He meant practice being by himself.

NINETEEN
    I don’t work most Fridays. No, that doesn’t mean I do a short week. Even though I pack forty-plus hours into my four-day calendar, Puritan guilt occasionally interferes with my enjoyment of the break that I schedule every week. Still, most Fridays I treasure the extra hours I have to spend with Grace, or to do an uninterrupted bike ride on relatively uncongested roads.
    That Friday wasn’t destined to be one of the days off that I treasured, however.
    I packed up Grace along with all her voluminous paraphernalia-once in college I went to Europe for a month with less stuff than Grace needed to go across town-and together we headed out of the house a few minutes after nine. We were going to do some errands. Not routine errands. Grace and I were skilled professionals at the grocery store and the dry cleaner. Returning videos? Getting gas? No problem. We could have a great time strolling the aisles at McGuckin Hardware or picking out a new pair of miniature tennis shoes at a shoe store. But the errands we had to do that Friday were errands I’d been putting off for weeks because they involved-gulp-public agencies and public utilities.
    If doing errands was purgatory, doing that type of errand was hell.
    Our first stop was the office that issues drivers’ licenses for the state of Colorado. I was due for a renewal. Technically, because I hadn’t been apprehended any of the times that I’d bent Colorado ’s traffic laws, the statute said that all that the renewal required was my right index fingerprint, my digital photograph, a few brief written questions, and fifteen dollars and sixty cents of my money. How long could that take?
    How long?
    Sixty-four minutes. I counted every one of them.
    Next stop: the United States Postal Service. I had to mail a small package to Italy. Once the customs forms were filled out, Grace and I got in line. Maybe twenty people were ahead of us. Three clerks at the counter. I did the math and told Grace, “Fifteen minutes tops, baby.”
    Moments later, one by one, two of the clerks mysteriously closed their windows and disappeared into the back of the building. Someone asked, “What kind of business closes cashiers when they have this many customers?”
    Nobody bothered to answer. The question was not only rhetorical, it was also supremely cynical. All of us in United States Postal Service suspended animation already knew we weren’t in Kansas anymore.
    There were still fifteen people in front of Grace and me in line. And at least that many had piled into the building behind us. Grace asked