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me?”
    â€œTo find out where you were.”
    â€œSusan.” Had someone been following me to and from school? Had this person been peeping through the windows? I was angry with Susan, although at the same time I was touched that she’d tried so hard to find me.
    â€œIt was the only way to contact you,” she said. “For a while when you were small I was living in New Jersey, and I used to take the bus across the George Washington Bridge and come down to Riverside Park and watch you. But then I moved to Indiana.”
    â€œYou used to watch me?”
    â€œI was always careful. No one knew who I was.”
    I used to see strangers in Riverside Park, idle men and women sitting on the benches, feeding bread crumbs to the pigeons. One of those strangers might have been Susan. My parents had warned me not to talk to strangers. I’d heeded their warnings with such diligence and fear that even when I was asked what time it was I looked down at the pavement and kept walking. Children could be kidnapped,just like Patty Hearst. Had Susan thought of kidnapping me? I’d read about birth parents who changed their minds and tried to retrieve their children.
    â€œIs the detective still following me?”
    â€œHe found you,” she said. “I don’t need him anymore.” She stared down at her lap. “I’m sorry.”
    She sounded sincere. I didn’t know what to do other than to tell her I forgave her.
    â€œA week ago,” I said, “I found out you weren’t Jewish.”
    â€œYou thought I was?”
    â€œIt’s what my parents told me. I believed it all my life.”
    â€œYour parents don’t approve of me, do they?” She’d left a tiny slice of turkey on her plate, pale and milky as a sliver of moon.
    â€œWhy would they disapprove of you? You’re the person who brought me into the world.”
    â€œThat’s true.” She seemed happy to hear me say this.
    She told me that her ancestors had come from Scotland, and I in turn told her about my Jewish heritage.
    â€œI stopped being religious in college,” I said. “But when I was a kid, I thought I’d be a baseball player in the spring and summer, and a rabbi the rest of the year.”
    Then I told her about Jonathan, Jenny, and Tara.
    â€œI know about them,” she said.
    â€œWhat do you mean?”
    â€œYou already mentioned your brother.”
    â€œAnd Jenny and Tara?”
    She seemed to regret having brought this up.
    â€œYour detective?”
    She nodded.
    â€œSusan—”
    â€œI’m sorry. But I would like to meet them.”
    I wanted her to meet them too, but I wasn’t pleased that she already knew about them. I considered laying down some groundrules. We’d meet only so often and in certain locations; we’d meet on my terms or we wouldn’t meet at all. But I couldn’t get myself to do this. I kept thinking of myself reversing our roles, treating Susan as if she were my child: This much TV, be home by midnight, don’t dye your hair green, no beer in the house.
    â€œWhy did you track me down?” I asked.
    â€œIt seemed time. When your child dies, it gets you thinking.”
    â€œI’m sorry.” I’d forgotten that her son had died. I wanted to tell her I’d do all right by her; I’d try not to let her down.
    â€œThere are articles about this. When a child dies, the sort of strain it puts on a marriage.”
    Was she talking about her own marriage?
    â€œAnother reason I’ve flown here is that I make earrings, and some stores in San Francisco want to sell my work.”
    â€œIs something wrong with your marriage?” I asked.
    â€œMy husband and I are on a trial separation.” She looked embarrassed. “I’m not good at much, am I?”
    â€œOf course you are.”
    â€œLike what?”
    â€œYou just told me about your earrings. You live in Indiana, and stores