Drama feels permanent while you’re inside it.

Then somebody announces the children’s breaking demonstration and people start buying lemonade again.

I went back to work.

That surprised people.

A woman approached.

“You’re actually going to fix the cable box?”

“Yes.”

“But you were a national champion.”

“The cable doesn’t care.”

She laughed.

I crouched beside the electrical enclosure.

My hip protested.

Daniel came over.

“Let me.”

“No.”

“You can barely bend.”

“Then enjoy the show.”

He stood beside me.

For a while, neither of us spoke.

Then:

“You shouldn’t have done that.”

I smiled.

“You said the same thing forty years ago.”

“I was nineteen.”

“And wrong.”

“You had a better hip.”

“Fair.”

Daniel watched me tighten the cover plate.

Then he asked:

“Why did you accept?”

I stopped.

That was the real question.

“I almost didn’t.”

“So why?”

I sat back on my heel.

“Because of how everybody laughed when I stumbled.”

Daniel looked toward the crowd.

I continued.

“Not because I was embarrassed.”

“Because Jake liked it.”

“He enjoyed making somebody smaller.”

Daniel listened.

“If I walked away, he’d tell himself I was afraid.”

“And tomorrow he’d do it to somebody else.”

Daniel nodded.

“So you taught him.”

“I reminded him.”

“Of what?”

I looked at him.

“That he doesn’t know enough about strangers to decide what they deserve.”

Daniel smiled.

“You always did make everything a lecture.”

“And you always needed them.”

“Still do.”

That evening, after the festival ended, I drove home.

Margaret was sitting on the porch.

Seventy years old.

Silver hair.

Book in her lap.

The woman responsible for the cane.

She saw me limp from the truck.

Immediately:

“What did you do?”

“Nothing.”

“Henry.”

“Fixed a sink.”

“Why are you limping worse?”

I sighed.

“There was a small disagreement.”

She closed the book.

“What kind?”

“A young man took my cane.”

Her eyes narrowed.

“And?”

“I got it back.”

She stared.

“Henry Carter.”

I sat beside her.

“He challenged me.”

“You’re seventy-two.”

“Everybody keeps saying that.”

“Because you’re seventy-two.”

“I know.”

She smacked my arm with the book.

I laughed.

Then told her everything.