Chapter 2

Henry stood backstage. He tapped his foot, waiting for Amal to join him. He had developed fifty different non-sequiturs to help Amal ease out of awkward conversations, and had used none of them in the past two years. Whenever he got Amal out of polite company, something better always came to mind. And even now, as he loitered by the makeup mirror, Henry ran through a couple of new dinner-party-enders in his mind, and made a mental note to ask Amal about “having to go iron the dog.&rdq...