"Be good, now," she said.
You can survive unloved, but you can't make it without loving somebody—or something. Ruby loved her birds. And who knows who else? He loved Lorna. Lorna loved Pike, or used to, and Molly, their daughter. Molly herself would be falling in love any time now, if she weren't already. Round and round we go, getting the job done. Except he hadn't gotten the job done, not unless you counted the paintings as kids. Not a happy train of thought. Piss on it, he'd have a waffle at Cleary's. Tide him over until the big feed.
On Thursdays they had the big feed, he and Riles and Kai. Thursdays, because weekends were unpredictable. He walked the six blocks to Cleary's, just around the corner from the house—Riles's house, Kai's house—he couldn't call it home exactly, although he'd spent more winters than he cared to remember in the basement studio reserved for caretakers or indigent relatives. He was a little of each—an old friend of Riles and useful around the place, watching the gallery several times a week and doing the framing jobs that came along.
The Cleary's waitresses were wearing Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil T-shirts. Not a bad image, from the cover of the best seller, but it annoyed him to see his friends wearing advertisements.
"Pecan waffle, Don?"
"Yes, Ma'm—for my strength. It's that time again. I'm going north."
"Take me with you."
"Can't afford you."
"Next year," she suggested.
"Do my best," Don said. "Something to live for. There's not much up there, Jilly, just Yankees, shivering and eating beans."