“Sound good.”
“That’s not the assignment.”
He frowned.
“What’s the assignment?”
“Mean what you’re singing.”
“But there aren’t even words yet.”
“Then perhaps you should write some.”
That became Owen’s next obsession.
For a week our dining table disappeared beneath notebooks.
He wrote terrible lyrics.
Then slightly less terrible lyrics.
Then surprisingly good ones.
He asked Mrs. Parker about Thomas.
Not the mystery.
The person.
What made him laugh?
What frightened him?
What did he believe?
What did he regret?
Mrs. Parker answered slowly.
Sometimes she didn’t answer at all.
And in those conversations, I began to understand that Owen’s project had stopped being about uncovering secrets.
He was trying to understand how people become memories.
One evening, I found Mrs. Parker sitting on our porch while Owen worked inside.
“You okay?” I asked.
She nodded.
Then said, “I spent a long time thinking endings were important.”
I sat beside her.
