Page 58 of The Fire Line

Jay took a bite and coughed when the horseradish reached his sinuses. “My mother would be offended by this sandwich.”

“Too small?”

“Insufficient infrastructure. Outdoor meals in my family require six containers, three arguments, and one woman insisting nobody has eaten while directly witnessing the opposite.”

“Greek?”

“My mother. My father’s Spanish.”

Harris nodded as though this confirmed something.

Jay pointed the sandwich at him. “You thought Navarro was Mexican, didn’t you?”

“Maybe.”

“My father’s family is from northern Spain. My mother’s parents came from Greece before she was born.”

“You grow up in New York?”

“Astoria. My mother treats every closed Greek bakery like evidence of cultural collapse. Relatives who moved to New Jersey are discussed as though they crossed an ocean.”

Harris folded the edge of his sandwich wrapper beneath his thumb. “You see ’em much?”

“As much as I can.”

Not entirely as much as they wanted.

“My mother stopped asking whether I’m coming home for things a few years ago,” Jay said. “Now she asks whether she should save me a seat.”

Harris looked at him. “You’re gone that much?”

“Sometimes.”

Harris’s expression communicated disbelief with impressive efficiency.

“Fine. Often.”

“How often?”

Jay smiled faintly. “You’re very curious today.”

Harris looked toward the valley, and that should have ended it. Instead, after a few seconds, he asked, “Miles ever travel with you?”

There it was.

“Not much. He couldn’t leave work.”

“You lived with him?”

“Four years.”

Harris kept his attention on the valley. “You still talk?”

“Usually.”

“What’s that mean?”

Jay watched him for a moment. Harris had managed to turn a casual question about an ex-boyfriend into something resembling a deposition while studying the landscape with suspicious intensity.