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     Robert stepped up to the open window and looked down at the backyard three floors below. “Huh,” he said as he grasped the sill and lowered slowly to one knee for a closer look. As a boy, he had enjoyed standing at this same window, like a bird in its nest, observing the goings-on of the surrounding suburban landscape – the postman making his rounds, a neighbor doing yard work, a squirrel crossing a power line. In the same spot all these years later, lulled by the drone of a distant lawn mower, he took note of the changes: the maple tree had finally emerged from the house’s shadow, its crown above the roofline, one leafy branch a handshake away; the giant spruce up on the corner was, however, gone – replaced by a hedge of azaleas; whoever lived in the house next door had a swimming pool where once had been a vegetable garden, and another house had grown a two-story addition on its back.

     As far as he knew, there was no one left from the old days, and it struck him that suburbia, relatively static on the surface, was in constant flux underneath. The physical changes, while noteworthy, were not redefining; the backyards of his youth were easily recognized from this window. Yet these changes were symptoms of the erratic yet inexorable ebb and flow of humanity that seeped through the neighborhood, into these houses, gradually eroding one era and depositing a new one.

     The rasp of a lighter drew his attention across the room. His older brother, Jeff, sat cross-legged on the floor, holding a freshly lit cigarette in one hand as he flipped the pages of a newspaper with the other, the remains of a deli lunch spread around him. It occurred to Robert that Jeff was the inverse of the neighborhood in which he grew up: the physical changes were pronounced, but inside he was still a teenager – a balding, swollen-bellied kid hanging out in the third-floor bedroom, enjoying a smoke and the sports page instead of a joint and The Rolling Stone.

     “Well, this house was always good to me,” Robert said, standing with a grunt and wiping his forehead with a shirtsleeve. Reflexively, he reached out and opened a closet door. From the bare interior sprang a memory: playing spin-the-bottle with some neighborhood kids, the bottle choosing him and the quiet, dark-haired girl who lived down the street. The shy glances, the awkward withdrawal into the closet, her warm breath against his cheek. His first kiss.  

     Jeff looked up, nodding slowly through a cloud of smoke. “Yeah, I’ll miss the old pad. I’m still amazed Mom stayed on until the end. She should have sold out when Dad died.”

     Robert shrugged. “I guess she didn’t want to let go. Hell, I wish we could hold onto it.”

     “And pay these taxes? Forget it.” Jeff said, turning back to his paper.

     “Yeah, I know,” Robert said. He did know the idea made no sense – he himself lived on the west coast and was still on the mend, emotionally and financially, from a messy divorce the year before. “I’m just saying it would be nice, you know?” He waited for a reply, but Jeff only took a bite of his sandwich and laughed at whatever he was reading as he flipped the page.

     Robert kicked one of three boxes on the floor. “So, these go down?” he asked.

     Jeff looked at the boxes. “Yeah, put ‘em in the back of my truck. While you’re out there, pull what’s left out of the garage. It’s bulky waste today. Just pile it on the curb.” He turned back to his newspaper. “I’ll be down in a few minutes.”

     Robert stacked two of the boxes and lifted them. “That one’s yours,” he said, kicking the third box and walking out. He carefully descended the stairs to the second floor and, breathing heavily, rested the boxes on the railing. Empty bedrooms surrounded him, doors agape. He looked in the bedroom his parents had shared, his eyes drawn to a broom lying next to a pile of dust bunnies in the middle of the floor. He stared, his stare turning trance-like as a long-dormant memory shook loose and rose, like an air bubble through water, into his consciousness, invoking him to lift the boxes and walk up to the room’s threshold. Inches from his face, imbedded in the inside plane of the door jamb, hung a small brass hook. He pressed the boxes against the door jamb and flicked it with his finger. It clanged softly against the wood. There was, he knew, the accompanying eye screw anchored to the inside plane of the door behind him. He closed his eyes and pictured a young boy stepping up to the closed bedroom door, turning the knob and, feeling resistance, knocking.

     Mom?

     What is it, Bobby?

     Can I come in?

     We’re taking a nap, honey. Why don’t you go downstairs and get yourself a cookie and milk. I’ll be down in a few minutes. 

     Robert smiled and shook his head. Training wheels. He turned around, leaned back against the door jamb and came face-to-face with the bathroom at the far end of the hallway, its two-tone yellow tile gleaming in a shaft of sunlight. Of course, bathrooms were for much more than simply going to the bathroom. They were sanctuaries of self-discovery and realization, and he recalled the summer day he had turned the knob of that door and, feeling no resistance, opened it to discover his teenage sister, Robin, standing at the sink. The bathroom sink was centered on the wall opposite the door, under a mirrored medicine chest, and Robin was there, gazing into the mirror, and she was naked. He remembered how she hadn’t flinched – this was extraordinary – had only shifted her gaze to meet his in the mirror’s reflection, her eyes a mix of curiosity and amusement, as if to say, Okay, little brother, this is it. Thoughts?   

     He had offered a hushed sorry and shut the door, retreating quickly down the stairs and outside to a neighbor’s yard where some of the other boys were lazing about on the grass, half-heartedly talking about starting a Wiffle ball game. He had feigned interest, but his mind was reeling. Wasn’t it just a week earlier that she had pinned him down on the living room rug and tickled him into fits of laughter? But something had been different about her as they wrestled on the rug that day, a vague sense that his big sister was changing, or had changed.

     Seeing her in the bathroom made it clear. He and Robin had always shared a special bond, one that neither of them ever felt with Jeff, but when he opened the bathroom door, he exposed a widening chasm between them that he had not known existed, a chasm that only she could bridge, and she made the effort to bridge it for him every day.

     He tightened his grip on the boxes and descended the stairs to the first floor, trudged through the hollow living room and gleaming kitchen and pushed out through the screen door into sun-soaked humidity. He walked up the driveway to Jeff’s pickup, dropped the boxes on the open gate and shoved them deeper into the bed. Turning around, he half-sat on the gate and wiped his brow.

He surveyed the yard. The old vegetable garden had turned breeding ground for young maples and crabgrass. The flower garden, too, was overrun, save a few irises arching valiantly above the tangle like generals refusing surrender. He stared at the irises for a few moments and then turned to the side yard, where he could still detect the faint outline of the pitcher’s mound – a bygone symbol of summer Saturdays and weekday afternoons, when children streamed like ants through the streets, parks and backyard alleyways that their parents never knew existed.

     He yawned, walked over to the open garage and peered inside. The air smelled faintly of engine oil and dead grass. Against a wall to his left were two rusted bicycles and some broken patio furniture. Further back were some boxes and garbage bags of miscellany that had attracted no buyers at the yard sale Jeff had held weeks before. He studied the bicycles. They were old Schwinns with upright handlebars and wide leather seats with springs. One was black, the other brown. He vaguely remembered them showing up shortly after a distant aunt died, and he recalled the day his parents had taken them out for an afternoon ride, Dad on the larger black one, laughing together as they disappeared down the street. An hour or so later they had come back on foot, looking tired and pushing the bicycles, Mom’s with a flat back tire. The bicycles had been put back in the garage and as far as he knew, they were never ridden again.

     He stepped forward and lifted the brown one. “Wow, heavy,” he muttered as he lowered it and wheeled it out to the curb and laid it on the grass. He went back, retrieved the black bicycle, rolled it out and laid it on top of the brown one. Returning to the garage, he was starting for the patio furniture when something by the back wall caught his attention. He walked over and stood before a rectangular table with dark walnut Formica top and rounded corners. A small white sticker on the tabletop read $10 in Jeff’s scrawl. He peeled the sticker off and flicked it aside. He brushed the glossy surface with his hand. “The old kitchen table,” he said. He paused, and then he quickly knelt and craned his neck – on the underside of the table were a Snoopy sticker and crayon scribble in several colors. He chuckled and stood up. Closing his eyes, he tried to picture the table in the kitchen nook, the family gathered around for dinner, back when they were all young and time seemed to stand still. Slowly, an image took shape: Jeff and him on the right side, Mom and Robin opposite, and Dad at the open end. 

     Focusing intently, he pressed both hands down on the laminate. Suddenly, the image sprang to life. There he was, his child self, squeezed between Jeff and the back wall, picking at the vegetables on his plate while Buddy, the family dog, nudged at his leg. And there was Jeff, leaning back in his chair, all shaggy hair and false bravado, rushing into his teens like a runner off the blocks. Dad the engaging salesman was Dad the engaging father in his polyester shirt and checkered slacks, a smile in his eyes and wisdom in all he said. Mom was there, too, looking serene in a floral dress and flip hairstyle, the dutiful housewife feeding her brood.

     And Robin. Her long brown hair flowing down her back like a river, silver hoops bouncing on her ear lobes. He watched as she pushed her chair back and lit a cigarette, exhaling emphatically as she disagreed with something Dad said. Why, she was a young woman – that was obvious now. He squeezed his eyes shut and tried to determine if this was before or after the bathroom incident, but the image began to fade, her face a dimming candle flame, and then she was gone.

     He opened his eyes, stepped back and regarded the table warily. He looked over at the pile of broken furniture. Right. He walked over, but as he reached for the furniture he stopped and gazed out through the garage window at the flower garden. A bumble bee landed on one of the irises. The flower bounced gently, the bee disappeared inside its petals, reappeared, and flew off. He rested his arm on the sill and pictured Robin and Mom in the garden, wearing floppy hats and cotton gloves, back when Robin was just a girl. He watched as they laughed and wiped the sweat from their brows, digging in the soft earth and planting the rhizomes, Mom patiently instructing Robin on the ideal planting depth to prevent rot. Each spring, they would return to the garden to tend to the irises and, if necessary, carefully dig up the plants, cleave off the old rhizomes and replant the healthy ones. He noted that there were only four irises blooming among the weeds. “They need replanting,” he whispered. He turned and looked at the table. Like a mistress it beckoned. He walked over, placed ten fingers on its surface and closed his eyes.

     For a while there was only darkness, like underwater at night. Then, the eerie tracings of police car lights on a bedroom ceiling, and a boy slipping out of bed and padding down the stairs into the harsh fluorescence of the kitchen, where two policemen were talking to Dad, the three of them turning to give him long, sad looks. Mom was at the kitchen table with a cigarette and eyes like faded roses, rising quickly and taking him back upstairs to his bed.

     A hug. And then: Bobby, there’s been an accident.  

     The screen abruptly went blank, like film snapping on the reel. “Christ,” he said, turning and blinking rapidly. He walked back across the garage, filled his arms with the broken furniture, and staggered to the street. He dropped the pieces into a hapless pile and headed back to the garage. When he was about ten feet away, he veered sharply left and marched into the flower garden, got down on his knees and began furiously pulling up the crab grass and maple saplings. Some of the maples snapped off at the base and the crabgrass held firmly to the soil. He stomped back into the garage, grabbed a shovel, and plunged into the garden, hunting down each maple stalk and patch of grass with vicious jabs of the shovel blade. When there was nothing left to attack, he went back to the garage, threw the shovel into a corner and walked to the house. Inside the kitchen, he turned the sink faucet on full cold, leaned over and drank heavily. He rinsed his hands, splashed water on his face and shut the faucet off.  Through the window, he appraised the four irises surrounded by clumps of yard waste.

     “That’s better,” he said. His focus shifted to the garage entrance. The faint outline of the table was visible in the recessed interior. “Okay,” he said. “Okay.” He walked back to the garage, stepped up to the table, and touched the surface as one would a planchette. He closed his eyes.

     The family had adjusted. Dad’s chair was moved around to face Mom, and Jeff took Robin’s spot opposite Bobby, the result being a tidy parent-son balance. Robin’s chair was put in the attic. For months, the low purr of a VW Bug passing on the street would cause him to stop what he was doing and look up, half expecting her to pull over and tell him to jump in. But life was a fast-moving river; slowly the sharp edges of pain and longing grew dull and half-forgotten, like carving knives in the back of the utensil drawer.  

     Mom and Dad were a different story. Dad got a new job that demanded frequent air travel, so his chair was empty a lot. This was just as well, for they started to bicker, and their bickering gradually mutated into fights that became part of the house, like a big, ugly piece of furniture in the living room, often leaving Jeff and Bobby alone at the kitchen table with a hastily prepared dinner. He was never sure if their fights were a manifestation of their shared loss or simply the telltale symptoms of a corroding relationship, but he came to realize that their marriage was like a rubber band constantly stretched to the limit but – for better or worse – never breaking.

     He opened his eyes, his hands slid off the table. Wearily, he walked to the front of the garage and looked across the driveway at the kitchen window. He pictured his aging mother sitting alone in the nook with a simple dinner, a glass of red wine and, afterwards, a cigarette. Every night with few exceptions for the last eight years of her life. Did she ever move from her traditional spot at the table? Surely not.

     “Wait a minute,” he said, snapping his fingers.  “Wait one minute.” He turned and walked back to the table, circling it slowly as he scanned its edge. “There,” he said. A distinctive dark smudge in the laminate. A cigarette burn, about an inch long. He touched it with his fingertip, explored the smooth interior, the bubbled edges. He closed his eyes.  

     When Jeff left for college, his chair was kept in place for his return at holiday breaks, but Dad moved back to the head of the table and Bobby and Mom sat opposite each other, like the three points of an equilateral triangle. It was a fitting configuration, for that year they were essentially equals, each living on a separate plane, Bobby free to do as he pleased.

     In February, his parents went away for a weekend. Left alone in the house for the first time in his life, Bobby threw a party. It turned out to be bigger than he expected, bigger than any of his parents’ parties, but the troublemakers behaved, and the cops didn’t show up. At one point, he looked out over the smoky din in the living room and screamed into his skull, Why did you do this?

     But he knew why, and he caught glimpses of her throughout the night, an elusive butterfly flitting from room to room. Sometime after midnight, as the party simmered down to a few stragglers playing records on the stereo, he caught up to her sitting in Mom’s spot at the kitchen table, chatting with a girlfriend. She moved over for him and the friend magically disappeared. She smoked and they talked and shared a beer. When he leaned over to kiss her, the party was forgotten, as was the cigarette. They slipped up the servant stairs to his bedroom and, rock music pulsing below, he confided in her his utmost secret. She smiled, nodded, and pushed him back on the bed. Slowly, gently, she introduced him to the mysterious world that Robin had warned him about all those years earlier.

     He opened his eyes and withdrew his hand. “Nina.” What was her last name? He didn’t remember – had in fact no idea what became of her. But the memory of her was seared into his brain as indelibly as the cigarette burn in the table’s glossy surface.

     He stretched and turned around. There was more stuff to be brought out to the curb, but he did not move. He couldn’t. He was caught in a gravitational pull, and the only release was to give in completely. He turned back and placed his hands on the tabletop. It was warm to the touch. He closed his eyes and lowered his head.  

     The next few years flew by in a series of flash cards: Jeff rejoining them at the table, having realized he was not the college type; Bobby discovering that college life suited him just fine and living the next four years in half-study, full-party mode, punctuated by a string of random, short-term and - overall – meaningless relationships. His presence at the table during this period had been sporadic. He was able to draw a mental sketch of the foursome gathered for a typical dinner, but he questioned its authenticity.  

     A garbage truck groaned on the next block. His eyes opened wide. He hesitated, and then he leaned forward, stretched his arms and took the table in an awkward embrace. He squeezed his eyes shut and tried to conjure one more image from the past: Denise and him sitting with Mom and Dad, having dinner, or breakfast, or just sitting. He had brought her to the house many times over the years. Surely, he could retrieve a memory of the four of them together. But nothing came.

     Denise had always been an avid runner and back when their relationship was young, he would sometimes rise early and accompany her on her morning routine. He pictured them returning to the kitchen after a good jog, faces flush, and joining Mom and Dad at the table for bagels and coffee. The image held for a surprisingly long time and then faded to white.

     He pressed his face against the laminate. “You ran right out of my life,” he said, running his fingers across the tabletop. “Right out of my life.” A single tear dropped onto the table. He remembered making the phone call to break the news. “She’s leaving me, Mom.” He had stressed that point. “No, there’s no other man…not yet anyway.” Her tone had turned from shock to pity as she offered comforting words of hope, even suggesting that he come back home for a visit.

     He released the table and stood up. It was the last heartfelt conversation with her that he could remember. The next call that came to mind was from Jeff, with the news that he had found her up in her bed, and that Bobby had better catch the next available flight home.

     The kitchen screen door slammed. He spun around. The garbage truck was pulling up out front. He quickly wiped his face on his shirt.  

     “What are you doing?” Jeff said, stomping into the garage. “They’re here.”

     “Sorry, I got distracted.”

     “Well, come on. Grab the other end.” Jeff stood where Dad had sat, his hands gripping the corners.

     “I want to keep it,” Robert said.

     Jeff laughed. “What, are you nuts?”

     “For old time’s sake.”

     “Bob, it’s shot, we have no use for it.”

     “Yeah, I know.” He struggled for the right words, words that Jeff would understand. For a moment, they faced each other across the table’s length.  “Ah, you’re right,” Robert said. “Out with it.” Together, they lifted the table and hurried it to the curb. Two men in dingy grey clothes were throwing the bicycles into the truck’s maw.

     “Too big,” one of them said, pointing at the table. Robert brightened.

     “Oh, come on,” Jeff said. “We’ll throw it in for you.” The man shook his head. “We can’t take nothin’ that big.”

     Jeff pulled out his wallet and handed the man a twenty-dollar bill. The man snapped it up and nodded to his partner. They picked up the table and flipped it into the truck. It landed upside down, like a dead, stiff animal. The man pulled a lever, and the metal jaw descended. As the table legs crumpled, Robert glimpsed the Snoopy sticker. Then it was gone. The men hopped into the truck and pulled away.

     “You can always grease those guys,” Jeff said. “Come on. Help me throw the rest into my pickup.” He started walking up the driveway.

Robert didn’t move. He watched the garbage truck turn the corner. “I should have kept it,” he said, but Jeff kept walking. Robert looked up, hopefully, at the house, but the house only stared back with blank eyes.