Rebecca inhaled and slowly let it out. Sean did the same. Gradually she increased her pressure, working at his heel, then his toes. When he flinched, she backed off, but never completely. It still hurt a lot, but an image began to grow in his mind of the pain in his feet, and how she wasn't really getting rid of it so much as molding it like clay, putting it back into its proper shape. And that seemed about right to him-that while his pain couldn't be completely eradicated, it could be made to behave. This thought was somehow comforting, and he found himself slipping off into a gauzy doze, remaining so even when she told him to turn onto his back. She held the sheet in place as he rolled over underneath it, and he realized it was the best he'd felt in months. Possibly years.

She came around behind his head and began to work at his shoulders and neck again. Suddenly she stopped, and he heard a little inhalation of breath. He wanted to open his eyes and see if everything was all right, but in his state of relaxation, his reflexes were slow. She began to knead his shoulders again, and the impulse to open his eyes passed, as he floated back down into the satiny swirl of semiconsciousness.

He couldn't say how much longer the rest of the massage took. He felt her fingers on his scalp, and across his forehead and around his cheekbones, and the next thing he knew she was massaging around an ankle. At the end she rested her hands lightly in several spots on his chest and stomach, as if her palms were stethoscopes listening to the internal flow of his body. They wavered over him, smoothing the air from his head to his toes and back up again.

"You can get up when you're ready," she whispered. When he opened his eyes she was gone.

Slowly he rose and got dressed. He walked out to the reception area feeling a little like when he used to get high with Hugh, only smoother and less giggly. Like when he used to pray and it worked. He smiled beneficently at Cleopatra as she took his credit card. "Would you mind adding a twenty-dollar tip on there?"

She raised her eyebrows and included the tip.

He looked back down the hallway, hoping Rebecca would appear. He wanted to see her, this phenom who'd molded his aches back into manageable chunks. But no one came.

CHAPTER 9.

"You've purchased new footwear, I see," said Aunt Vivvy, lifting a forkful of peas to her mouth.

Kevin leaned off his chair to look but popped up again when a growl came from under the table.

"George," chided Aunt Viv, and the dog quieted.

"Yeah, my back's been hurting, so I went to this specialty store over in the mall. They recommended these."

"Your old ones were all worn down on the bottom," said Kevin. Aunt Vivvy raised her eyebrows. "Well, they were," he said.

"How nice to have you join the conversation," she replied.

Kevin kept his eyes on Sean. "You could hike in those."

"I probably could. Not much mountain climbing around here though."

"Jansen Hill," said Kevin. "You can get to it through the woods out back."

"Maybe you'll take me sometime. Hey, how about after the parade tomorrow?"

Kevin shrugged and stuffed a hunk of buttered bread in his mouth.

Later, after the dishes had been done and Aunt Vivian and George had retired to her room, Sean found Kevin watching television in the den off the living room. On screen, a man was walking across sand dunes and apparently talking to himself. His accent was Australian.

"What's this?"

"Man vs. Wild." Kevin's voice was low and reverent. "It's this guy, Bear Grylls. He gets himself lost in jungles and deserts and stuff on purpose. Then he has to find his way out."

Sean watched as the man talked about the critical importance of keeping hydrated.

"But he's not alone, right?" said Sean. "He's got a film crew."

Kevin frowned. "How else could we see it?"

"True. So, any chance you want to come with me to the parade tomorrow? I have to help out my friend Cormac, the guy who owns the bakery."

"Not really," said Kevin, gazing intently at the small screen. The man had taken off his T-shirt and appeared to be peeing on it, the camera discreetly aimed above his waist.

"You should come. It'll be fun."

"Parades are boring."

"Maybe you could work with me in the bakery."

At that moment, Bear Grylls raised the wet T-shirt over his face and squeezed the liquid-his own urine-into his mouth. Kevin and Sean let out simultaneous groans of disgust.

To their relief, a commercial came on. "Seriously, you should come," Sean said. "Cormac says we can have all the pie we want."

Kevin looked skeptical. "What would I have to do?"

"Just hang with me and help out. Tell you what, I'll even slip you a twenty. Cormac's insisting on paying me, so you can be my subcontractor."

Kevin thought about this for a minute, eyes blinking pensively. "Okay. But if I don't like it, I can leave and you don't have to pay me."

"Deal."

They walked over to the Confectionary the next morning, Kevin recounting the many instances of Bear Grylls eating disgusting things like a fat squirming rhino beetle larva the size of a gummy worm.

"I brought reinforcements," said Sean when Cormac let them in.

"Excellent! Welcome aboard, Kevin my man." Cormac held his hand out, and Kevin hesitated, then gave it a perfunctory little slap. He stepped back to Sean's side and surreptitiously scanned the bakery. "Smells good," he murmured.

"Hope so," said Cormac. "Otherwise I'm in the wrong line of work."

He showed Sean how to run the register, the shorthand for writing customers' orders on coffee cups, where to find pastry bags and extra napkins. He addressed all of this to Kevin, too. "Because you know your uncle's going to forget something, and you'll have to be his backup hard drive." Kevin glanced up at Sean, a tiny smile lighting his features.

Cormac assigned Kevin the job of retrieving pastries from the big glass display case and putting them in the to-go bags for Sean. "Throw on a pair of these, okay?" said Cormac, handing them both stretchy vinyl food service gloves. He turned to get the coffee started.

Kevin held them between thumb and forefinger. "I don't like these," he whispered.

"What's wrong with them?" Sean donned the tight-fitting gloves, snapping them around his wrists.

"They feel weird."

"They're not that bad. You get used to them."

Kevin pressed his lips together. "I don't want to."

Sean stared at him for a moment. "Kevin, can you just try? Because I think it's a rule."

The boy slid his fingers halfway into one of the gloves, then quickly pulled it off again. "I can't do it." Sean tried to hide his annoyance, but the kid hadn't made much of an effort.

Cormac glanced over. "Not a fan, huh?" he said. "Okay, I have this other kind-they're plastic and kind of loose, so you're going to have to keep tugging at them to stay on." He opened a cabinet and took out another box. Kevin made a face when he put them on, but he didn't complain.

Customers were waiting outside, and Cormac went to open the door, calling "Happy Fourth of July! Check out the red, white, and blue cupcakes-specially priced to honor our forefathers."

"And mothers," said a voice. "John Adams was just a short guy in a bad wig without Abigail."

"Too right, chickie," said Cormac.

Though he hadn't seen her in many years, Sean immediately recognized Cormac's cousin Janie. She held a little girl on her hip and headed toward the counter. Behind her was a man with thinning auburn hair holding a boy's hand. Cormac shook the guy's hand and said to the little boy, "Hey, where's my hug!" He leaped up and Cormac caught him for a quick squeeze.

When they approached, Sean waited to see if Janie would notice him. Her light blue eyes went wide for a second, and she said, "Spinster! No way!" She came around the end of the counter and hugged him. "Ow!" said the little girl. "You cwushing me!"

Janie introduced her daughter, Carly, and her five-year-old, Dylan. "Almost six," insisted Dylan. "Like five and four quarters."

Sean laughed, and Janie said, "We'll work on that one." Then she laid a hand on the arm of the man and said, "This is Tug Malinowski." There was a hint of awkwardness that Sean recognized, having known her in the gawky inelegance of her teenage years. He supposed she hadn't quite figured out what term to use when she introduced the new love of her life. But then she slid her hand into Tug's, and almost imperceptibly both of their faces went a shade happier.

Sean had witnessed this often enough, the way even the mildest physical contact could change a person's visual. A patient would be failing, but then someone close to her would arrive, and her color would immediately improve, her vitals reflecting the uptick. He could almost see Tug's red blood cell count increasing. It seemed to have the same effect on Janie as well.

Sean reached out to shake Tug's available hand. "I've heard good things."

Tug seemed pleased by this, his glance shifting briefly to Cormac. "Likewise," he said.

Dylan pulled him over to peruse the cupcakes. Barb came through the door, and Carly wiggled out of her mother's arms and ran over. Momentarily alone, Sean and Janie took the chance to catch up. After a few minutes he said, "I was really sorry to hear about your husband, Janie."

"Thanks." She nodded. "He was a good guy. You would've liked him."

It caught at him for a moment, the look on her face. Smart-alecky Janie Dwyer with a permanent whisper of pain behind her eyes. "How're you holding up?" he asked gently.

"Better," she said. He suspected it was the way he felt about losing his mother at such a young age and, not long after, his father. You could never really be fine about it, but you could slowly, haltingly learn to feel better than you did when it was freshly excruciating.

Customers started arriving, and Sean had to return to cash register duty. Janie and Tug took the kids to set up chairs along the parade route, Janie calling, "Catch up with you later, Spinster!" over her shoulder.

"Spinster?" said Kevin, when there was a break between customers. "What's that?"

Sean chuckled. "Well, it's kind of a nickname. Cormac used to call me Spin because we were on the tennis team together and I guess I had a pretty good topspin. And then Janie started calling me Spinster as a joke, because it's a word for an old woman who never got married."

"Good one," Kevin nodded, grinning slyly.

"Thanks a lot!" Sean laughed. It struck him how Kevin's round, green eyes could be so Hugh-like when the boy was joyful.

The Confectionary got very busy just before the parade started. Everyone wanted to make sure they were fully stocked with caffeine, carbohydrates, and fruity drinks before settling into their beach chairs along the route. Barb manned the cappuccino machine, and Cormac handled the big orders while Sean and Kevin served customers. Once the parade was streaming by, however, traffic into the shop dwindled. Kevin wandered over to sit on one of the high stools by the front window to watch the cavalcade of performance groups and unusual vehicles.

"Hey," said Sean, wiping coffee puddles off the counter. "You said parades are boring."

"They're okay."

"You can go outside and watch if you want. Just keep an eye out, in case more customers show up."

"I can see from here."

"Seriously, it's fine. Go on out."

"I like it here."

Sean looked up. Kevin's mouth was set, as if he were ready for a fight. "Hey, it doesn't matter to me," said Sean. "I was just thinking you could hear better out there."

Kevin grumbled to himself, and Sean decided to ignore it.

Cormac and Barb emerged from the storage room. Her pink lipstick looked weirdly smudgy, and a sprig of his hair stuck out at an odd angle from his head. Oh, my God . . . they were making out, Sean realized. Sucking face in the back room like a couple of teenagers!

"So, um," said Barb, tightening her ponytail. "How's your back?"

Sean busied himself with refilling the napkin dispenser to hide his knowing smile. "Pretty good actually. I went for that massage-thanks to you," he emphasized this point. "And I definitely feel better."

"That's fantastic!" Barb clapped her hands together. "Isn't Missy a dream?"

"Oh, uh . . . Missy was having a little trouble of some kind. A woman named Rebecca took over. She was great."

Barb was skeptical that any massage therapist could be better than Missy. Sean finally succeeded in convincing her that, although he'd suffered the misfortune of being massaged by someone else, Rebecca had kept him from feeling completely deprived. "She had this way of . . . well, it hurt, but it was like a useful kind of pain, so I didn't mind it. Also, her voice was very relaxing. Like we'd be talking about something serious, but . . . I don't know. It all seemed good."

Cormac hung an arm over Barb's shoulder and grinned. "Well, fly me to the moon, Spin."

Sean felt his face go warm. "Ah, shut your pie hole."

After the parade there was another rush of customers, but by noon the doors were locked and the four of them were cleaning out the coffee urns and putting things away.

"Kevin," said Cormac. "Come on over to the display case and pick your favorite."

Kevin's face lit up with shy excitement as he went to claim his prize. Cormac put a hand on his shoulder, and Sean saw Kevin sidestep away. He chose a piece of blueberry pie.

"You probably want the smaller slice," said Cormac. "I don't want to burden you with that big slab." Kevin held his breath for a moment. He glanced up at Cormac. "I'm just kidding!" Cormac assured him. "After all your hard work, you can have the whole pie if you want."

"Really?"

"Kevin . . ." warned Sean.

"It's the Fourth of July," said Cormac. "Pursuit of happiness day. Let the kid have his pie."

After they closed up shop, Cormac and Barb went down to Belham Town Beach on the shore of Lake Pequot to meet up with the rest of his family. It was their tradition to picnic and swim until the fireworks were set off at the far side of the lake in the evening. They invited Sean and Kevin to join them, and Sean would've loved to spend the day floating around in the cool lake water with the McGraths.