Then She Found Me by Elinor Lipman

brown toupee. Frank asked me without greeting if I remembered Kyle Bui, class of eighty-five, maybe eighty-six; a Vietnamese boy? He’d just sent Frank a letter from Notre Dame—the damned nicest letter—saying Honors English had been a good foundation and he was majoring in English.
    I said I’d had him for three years, was disappointed he chose Notre Dame over Columbia, but I was glad he sounded happy.
    “Kyle Bui?” Kiki asked, frowning. “Did he play any sports?”
    “I doubt it,” I said.
    “Notre Dame’s a big jock school,” Kiki informed us.
    Frank looked distressed that Kiki was of his school, his profession, his species. “Kyle was a reader,” he said, again to me.
    I reminded him that Kyle had won the Latin prize his senior year. Frank smiled. He knew I was the only judge,and grade-point average was the only criterion. He had come to the right place. There was a lull in conversation that made me look up. Dwight Willamee was in the doorway with his industrial thermos and his lunch, staring at the nearly full table.
    “Dwight!” I said, his only greeter. He hesitated before walking slowly to the one empty seat. Before he reached it Kiki said, “Lou sits there every day. He’ll be down in a sec.”
    “Sorry,” said Dwight.
    I stood up and moved my chair to one side. “Here,” I said. “Pull one over and squeeze in.” My colleagues picked up their chairs by the seat and put them down again one inch farther away. “More,” I said. “Norman, Chuck, you, too, please.” No one stood to say, Never mind, I’m just about to leave. You can have my seat. Or How ya doing, Dwight? I motioned again for him to bring a chair from the other table and sit with us. Look—all the room in the world.
    Dwight hesitated. I could tell from his pained expression that he was about to back out of the lunchroom murmuring, No. Please. I’m disrupting you. I’ll go back to the library. I’m obviously not wanted.
    “I was going to find you for a postmortem on last night,” I said loudly.
    “You were?” said Dwight.
    “Are you going to sit?”
    He hoisted a chair up in the air, landed it in the negotiated space, and sat down. He took a sandwich out of his bag and removed the plastic wrap. People were listening, waiting to hear what Mr. Willamee could possibly have to say to me about the evening before. He shook his head very slightly and smiled, just shook his head and smiled as if he needed more time and fewer interested parties.
    I said to the table, “Dwight got dragged to a familydinner last night, which turned out to be excruciating.”
    “Whose family?” asked Kiki.
    “Mine.”
    “What was the occasion?” she asked.
    “No occasion,” I said.
    Kiki looked around to see who was catching this. She squinted at me—C’mon, April. Are you serious or what? “Are you two on a committee together?” she asked.
    “Sort of,” said Dwight.
    “Dwight’s been helping me research something about my family.”
    “That’s nice,” said Kiki. She stood up, cocked her finger at two phys ed teachers in windbreakers. “See you guys.” She walked away, tray in hand, the green soles of her aerobic shoes flashing against their white uppers. I pushed her chair away from the table and claimed the space.
    Frank Scanlon spoke around me to Dwight. “What kind of research is Miss Epnah doing on her family?”
    Dwight reached for his thermos and unscrewed the stopper. “Miss Epnah can probably tell you herself,” he said.
    “Genealogical,” I said.
    “A new hobby?” asked Frank.
    “Coffee?” Dwight asked. I nodded.
    “What are you?” asked Frank.
    “Jewish,” I said.
    “I mean your nationality.”
    “American.”
    “And before that?”
    “Nothing,” I said.
    Frank said, “We all came from somewhere, even the Indians.”
    “Except me,” I said. “I didn’t.”
    Dwight leaned forward and said, “April’s a little discouraged with our research.”
    “Everyone comes from somewhere,” Frank