LITMIR.BIZ

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he didn’t seem to be driven by any particular purpose. Emily supposed she could be full of advice, and, in fact, should be, but she was too busy doling it out to her clients every day. Besides, she’d done her time. When they were children, her parents had impressed upon her that her main responsibility was to look after her little brother. On the rare occasions her parents went out, she had to babysit. She was expected to help Michael with his homework and provide a good example in school. In a way, since she spoke English fluently and understood things like what should packed in an American child’s lunchbox (definitely not pickled vegetables) or that American children received allowances for doing the simplest household chores (and more than a quarter per chore), it was as if she were another parent.

      The cab stopped, and Emily got out into the warm, humid night. She stood in front of a building that must have once been peach-colored brick underneath the layer of grime. The tree-lined street was more pleasant than she had expected, the metal-gated storefronts only lightly adorned with graffiti. The skeleton of a luxury apartment building at the corner indicated better things to come.

      By the side of the front door was a row of buzzers. The name next to Michael’s was something undecipherable, apparently having been scratched out multiple times. She rang it, anyway. The intercom did not crackle to life, nor did the door release. She rang it again, still nothing. For the first time, she felt a twinge of apprehension. Maybe her mother wasn’t so off base. But Emily knew she was getting ahead of herself. Michael could be out, or perhaps the buzzer didn’t work. Then she noticed the door was slightly ajar, probably to let a breath of air into the stifling hallway that she now entered.

      The apartment was on the fifth floor but seemed much farther. As Emily climbed the steep stairs, the temperature appeared to increase by a degree with each step. It didn’t help that she was wearing a high-necked blouse and slacks, her approximation of business casual. When she reached the top, she paused to catch her breath from what air was left up there. The ceiling was very low; if she reached up, she could touch the skylight, which was dingy with pollution and pigeon droppings. It hardly seemed possible that there was a livable space behind the single door at the end of the landing. There was a buzzer, but unlike the one downstairs, it hung by a frayed electrical wire, like an eye from a socket, indicating its uselessness. She figured if anyone was inside, they must have heard her approach by now.

      Emily lifted her hand to knock, but before she could make contact, the door opened. Behind it was a young blond man with glasses. For an instant she thought she had the wrong address. But she had the uncanny feeling that the look on his face reflected her own. Both of them had been expecting to see the same person: Michael.

      Then the young man rearranged his features and extended his hand. “You must be Emily.”

      Emily took it. “And you are . . . ?”

      “David?” He spoke as if he was unsure of his own name. When it didn’t seem to register with her, he said, “I’m guessing Michael never told you. I’m his boyfriend.”

      They sat across from each other at the table, Emily and David, glasses of water sweating condensation onto the surface. A single fan idly pushed air around the tiny studio and out a window, but it didn’t seem to help. Even the walls looked sticky in the heat.

      Some people—under the age of thirty, Emily thought—might find the space delightfully bohemian. It was small and low-ceilinged, full of odd angles in which no furniture could possibly fit. A scarred strip of linoleum, upon which sat a metal sink, a half fridge, and a camp stove, indicated the beginning and end of the kitchen. The half-open cupboard above the stove contained two cereal bowls and two plates, two glasses, and a commemorative mug. A pilled green futon that looked like it had been salvaged from the street, covered in a tangle of sheets, was pushed up against the wall. Besides that, there was no furniture other than the table and chairs that were being used to sit in.

      Having surveyed the room, Emily now turned her attention to her brother’s boyfriend. Judging by the faint crinkles at the corners of his blue eyes, she guessed he was older than she had initially thought, possibly in his early thirties. She supposed he was good-looking enough, in a bland sort of way. Conservative haircut, weirdly old-fashioned but expensive-looking wire-rimmed frames. Despite the heat, he was nicely dressed in a pale-colored linen suit. When she glanced down, she saw that his shoes shone a rich chestnut brown. He must have also come from work, except that he was better dressed than she was.

      “Are you okay?” David asked.

      Emily jerked her head up, embarrassed at being caught giving him the once-over. “I’m just worn out from the stairs.”

      “I mean,” he said pointedly, “are you okay with Michael being who he is? What he is?”

      She was suddenly defensive. “What makes you think I didn’t know?” She looked away. “All right, I didn’t know. My parents definitely didn’t. He never said anything about it. But it doesn’t matter. It’s fine with me if he’s gay.”

      There, she had said it. “How did you two meet?”

      David smiled nervously, the creases at the corners of his eyes deepening. “I know this sounds like a cliché, but we met at the Pride parade about a year ago. Not to worry, we weren’t actually in the parade. We were both stuck on the same side of the street, trying to cross over—we were supposed to meet friends for lunch. We decided to give up and just have lunch together.”

      “Very cute,” Emily allowed. “So you’ve been seeing each other for about a year? You must have known him when . . .”

      “Your father passed away? Yes. Actually, I was with him when he found out.”

      Emily shook her head, trying to recast her memory of telling Michael to involve another person in the same room. The scene was getting too crowded.

      “I didn’t expect to go to the funeral or anything,” David said. “I knew we hadn’t known each other long enough for that. And I understood why he wouldn’t want me to meet his family.”

      And still doesn’t, Emily thought. She tried to be charitable. “Well, it makes me feel better to know that he’s had someone this past year to help him deal with everything.”

      The look on David’s face made her wish she hadn’t jumped to conclusions. “To be honest,” he said, “we haven’t been together the entire year. It’s been sort of off and on. I’ve been pushing for more commitment from him. Even asked him to move in with me.” He nodded at the walls around them. “As you might have noticed, this place isn’t the most comfortable. I have an apartment uptown, where we spend most of our time together—that is, when we are together. I’m away during the day, so he’d have the space all to himself.”

      “And what is it that you do?” Emily asked politely.

      “I’m a lawyer.”

      “Huh,” Emily said, without volunteering more information. Her mother would love that.

      “I’m afraid I pushed him too far about moving in, and we argued about it. Michael’s very independent. You probably know that.”

      Emily nodded, not wanting to dispel his belief that they were close siblings. Not that David would have believed her, anyway, if she hadn’t even known that her own brother was gay. She wondered just how much Michael had told David about her or their parents.

      “It just seemed like a good idea, since he was laid off last month,” David added.

      “What? He never mentioned that he’d lost his job.”

      “Guess he didn’t tell you a lot.”

      Emily tried to ignore that jab. “Tell me more about your argument.”

      “Months ago I made him give me a key to his place, though he never wanted one to mine.” David gave a short laugh. “Earlier this week I tried to give him a key, and we argued about it, and he left my place in a huff. I’ve tried calling him since then, don’t know how many messages I left. Then this morning when I called, the mailbox was—”

      “Full,”

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