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But over the mantel, on the wall that had been entirely rebuilt following the fire, there was no mark to show where there had once been a picture taken by Mom: L.L. reclining on a lounge chair, a wineglass in one hand, pen in the other, marking up a script propped on his knees, a sleeping baby in his lap. And beyond him, mugging and holding his own child over his head like a trophy, Chev's dad, a cigarette between his lips, sideburns to his jawline, his wife beside him in a purple Mexican housedress, brushing long gold hair.

I walked past the absent photo and out onto the deck where it had been taken.

Ringed with wood vegetable crates filled with more waterlogged books, by the light of several candles pressed into a mass of melted wax that flowed over a rusting tin-top table and dripped to the planks below, L.L. dozed with an open copy of Tom Jones on his stomach.

—L.L.

He lurched, came awake with a phlegmy cough.

—Nguh. Hm.

He took his glasses off and rubbed his eyes without turning.

—Money's in the jar, Raj. Leave it anywhere.

He put the glasses back on and started to crane his head around, the book slipping from his belly and onto the deck.

—Could you maybe take out a few of the empties for me?

He saw me. Cleared his throat. Looked at the book he'd dropped.

—I'd make a cliché comment about the prodigal, but it wouldn't really apply, would it?

He reached for the book, missed it, and his shoulder jostled the table, sending the candle flames jittering and the various glasses and empty bottles clinking.

I bent and picked up the book and held it out to him.

—Here.

He took it.

—Thank you.

He found his place and scanned the page.

—Thought you were the delivery boy.

—Late for deliveries.

He looked at his watch.

—Suppose it is.

I nudged a box of full bottles by the table.

—Looks like he was here earlier.

L.L. pulled his glasses low on his nose and looked at me over the rims.

—Is that someone I know casting judgments about? Is that, wait, allow me to cup my ear.

He cupped his hand to his ear and angled his head at me.

—Is that perhaps the voice of my absent wife speaking to me through her son?

He removed his hand.

—A prodigious bit of ventriloquism for her to accomplish from her far northern climes. Perhaps, if I speak distinctly, I can send a message back to her via the same medium.

He put his hand to the side of his mouth.

—Althea, dear bitch, get out of the boy's head, he's sufficiently fucked up now, we need neither of us endure in the effort.

He wiped his brow.

—There. With luck that will transmit to her and she will desist in dispensing her opinions about how I live my life, through my own flesh and blood. However misbegotten said flesh and blood may be.

He took a full bottle of Seagram's from the carton and held it to the light.

—Drink?

I shook my head.

—No thanks.

He shrugged, picked up a glass, sloshed the dregs at its bottom over the edge of the deck into the toyon, chaparral, coast oak and walnut growing up from the hillside, and poured himself a double.

—I'll have one for the both of us.

I moved some books from another chair and took a seat.

—Was there any doubt?

He saluted me with the glass.

—In your mind? Apparently none.

He downed the whiskey.

—But I generally don't drink alone.

I looked back into the dark house, the moonlight glinting off all the empty bottles.

—Been having a lot of company, have you?

He swung his arm in an arc, indicating his massed library.

—My oldest friends. My enduring companions. Those that stand by me.

I picked at the wax on the table.

—And experiencing the delights of Renaissance technology, as well, I see.

He topped off his glass, sipped this time.

—The electric bills. They send them, God knows they're here somewhere, I just never quite find the time to deal with them.

I looked up at the sky, remembered that same sky projected inside the Griffith Observatory planetarium, how the stars would swim and race down the horizon as the view shifted, season by season, between the hemispheres. L.L.