“Went through a rough stretch for awhile. That’s why you didn’t hear from me, Dad. The move from the Lost Coast was harder on me than I expected. I guess you could call it an identity crisis, you know what I mean. Or maybe you don’t know. Anyway I got a little out of control there. Okay, a lot out of control. But I’m getting my shit together now.”

It was a little after noon and Sally and I were sitting across from each other in the Taste of Himalaya’s tented outside space. My daughter looked fresh, sassy, and even well rested. Given what she said, I puzzled over the fact that she hadn’t asked me for any money in the last weeks. Did that mean she was dealing or making money in some other illicit way? I could ask myself that question and worry about it if I wanted something new to agonize about, but I couldn’t ask her. Years ago, when I went to Al-anon meetings because of her mother’s alcoholism, I’d learned a popular boundary-building motto: Why am I talking? I knew one woman who tattooed the acronym WAIT on the inside of her wrist. The idea was to not pepper your qualifier with questions, just to listen and observe.

I did notice, among other things, that Sally’s hands were beautifully cared for. She had a white-tipped French manicure and elaborate designs hennaed on the backs of her palms. Just before the waiter arrived with our lunch platters, I told Sally how beautiful her hands were.

“Thanks, Dad. I thought it was a better idea to focus on my hands than my face, even though my face needs more help.”

“Your face doesn’t need any help, Sal. It’s beautiful.”

“Like your unbiased. How about the gap between my teeth?”

“It’s charming.”

Sally flashed me a silly gap-tooth smile, and then we went at our food. I got into trouble almost immediately. For some reason, I’d ordered my Shrimp Tikka Masala spicy. Usually I have it medium and struggle with the piquancy, but now it was blistering. I guzzled much of my Racer 5 in an effort to put out the fire. When that provided only short-term relief, I tried tamping down the heat by stuffing hunks of naan into my mouth. Sally, who ordered her Aloo Bantu, curried eggplant and potatoes, mild, started laughing at me. My eyes were running; so was my nose, which I blew into my already damp handkerchief.

“Drink a glass of milk, Dad.”

I nodded but, when the waiter passed by, I ordered another Racer 5.

“So just to finish up,” Sally said, stabbing a cube of eggplant with her fork, “I lost my job at Whole Foods but ended up with a gig at Sonoma Market. From one supermarket to another. You’d think they’d share information about personnel. When I got the second gig, I kept thinking of your cliché phrases. ‘The right hand doesn’t know what the left hand is doing.’ ‘Never a twain shall meet.’”

“You sound like you landed on your feet,” I said, my mouth still afire.

”Yep, I haven’t snorted anything for three weeks; I’m not hanging out with any bad boys, and I’m going to virtual AA meetings twice a week. I have a sponsor named Eileen Goode. Isn’t that a great name for a sponsor?”

“That’s great, Sal. Next you’re going to tell me you found religion.”

“Nope. You’ve got to draw the line somewhere. There’s only so far I’m willing to go to stay clean.”

After she finished eating, Sally laid her hands flat on the table. I supposed that she wanted me to admire the hennaed medallions. They were lovely and meticulously applied.

I nodded toward her hands. “Who did the handiwork?”

“My friend from Whole Foods, Sarita. I traded her the rest of my stash for her trouble.”

“Share and share alike.”

“There’s another of those phrases. You’re like a repository of clichés from the Middle Ages, Dad.”

“I don’t think they go back that far,” I said and, dangerously, bit into another shrimp, which delivered a flash of tasty pleasure and an extended agony of picante.

“So here’s why I called the meeting, Dad.”

Again, I tried to douse the fire with beer. “You make it sound like we’re doing business.”

“We need to. That’s my point. I’m talking about Roscoe. Look, you need a partner. You’ve created an exceptional brand and you’re letting it flounder.”

I chomped down on the rest of the jumbo shrimp. Yow. “Brand? You’re talking like a Trump, Sal. Did you see the bastard wants his name on the vaccine? It should only go on the virus.”

“This isn’t about politics, Dad. The deal is you need to seize the day with Roscoe. You know carpe diem and all that. Another of your phrases from the Middle Ages. “

“That’s Latin antiquity, Sal.”

You realize you infested my childhood with your linguistic prattle.”

Infested?”

“That’s right, I’m a prisoner of the language because of you.”

For a moment it sounded like my thinking parrot speaking rather than my daughter. “You’re serious, Sal?”

“Serious as a heart attack.” Her head jerked back. “See, that’s you talking, Dad. I would never say that, serious as . . ..”

“You just said it.”

“You don’t get it, Dad.”

I opened and shut my mouth like a fish a few times; it seemed to temper the residue of chili.

“What are you doing, Dad?”

“Trying to breathe. And what exactly is your complaint, Sal: I’ve strangled you with used-up constructs, what Orwell calls dying metaphors?”

“Yes, with proverbs and platitudes and commonplaces.” Sally threw her hennaed hands in the air; she was doing a version of teenage drama girl at age thirty. “With bromides and buzzwords. With threadbare phrases, truisms, and shibboleth. . .”

“All that? Back to carpe diem, which, by the way, is from the Roman poet Horace; he died not long before Christ was born.”

“Don’t you tire of all that minutia running around your brain?”

“Beautiful word, minutia. Just like shibboleth. I’m glad to hear you use those words, Sal.”

“Enough. Can you try to stay on task, Dad?”

“Task?”

“We’re talking about branding. We’re talking about Roscoe. We’re talking about how to keep him relevant. Capiche?”

“Capiche? Sounds to me like you’re rocking the lingua franca now.” I swilled the cold beer around my mouth and wondered if chili peppers could leave lasting lacerations on my tongue and gums. “So what are your ideas for Roscoe?”

“Ideas? I don’t have any ideas. You’re the idea man. I provide support. I provide direction. Listen, Roscoe has a platform. With proper management he can accrue tens of millions of followers. Ask yourself what he can contribute to mankind.”

“That’s a tall order, Sal.”

“Would you expect anything less? These are serious times.”

My daughter sounded like she’d been watching executive training videos.   “And I remind you, as I will always remind you,” she continued, “that the success of our enterprise depends on the perception that Roscoe is an illusion. If it ever gets out that he’s an actual parrot, we’re sunk.”

“And why is that?”

“Think about it, Dad. Now that the virtual world has supplanted the actual, artifice is our only currency. What dazzles us about a magic act is not seeing how it’s done, but the illusion of its impossibility. You taught me that when I was a kid.”

“So it all comes back to haunt me.” I purposely spilled a little beer over my lower lip—it still sizzled where a large shrimp had seared it—and in so doing a little dripped onto the table.

“Dad,” Sally implored.

“Okay, let me get this straight. You want me to fabricate an illusion that something quite real, and spectacular for that reason, is illusory?”

“Exactly. I think you’re catching on, Dad. So can you rise to the occasion? I think we should meet here in three days and see what you have?”

“You want to reconnoiter in three days, Sal?”

“Stop, Dad. I don’t see why you continue to bludgeon me with language.”

“Because I’m on fire.”

With that, I slipped on my mask and left half of my meal uneaten.

“You should order mild next time, Dad. I don’t know who you were trying to impress.”

“You.”

“I know you too well for that to happen.”

I crept off feeling a bit like Rodney Dangerfield, and tipsy from the two pints of Racer 5. When I got back to the complex Pina was sitting on the stairs outside my condo, chewing on a bagel with cream cheese squirting out the sides.

“Hey, you,” I called.

She looked up startled. “Oh, you scared me, Charlie.”

“Why are you sitting there?”

“Waiting for you,” she said, watching me, big-eyed, as if I might object to her presence.

“Why aren’t you inside?” It had to be chilly on the cement stairs in the shade.

Pina stood. Her leanness melted into the railing and she wiped her lips on her sleeve. “I didn’t think I should go in without you’re being around, Charlie.”

I scooted up the steps and gathered her in my arms.

“I don’t know if you want me here.” Pina blew out an O of breath as if she were blowing a smoke ring. “Can I come back?”

“Nothing would make me happier.”

“Oh, Charlie.” Pina picked up the white bag at her feet.

“What’s in there?”

“Nine bagels. Well, eight and a half.”

“And you started with a dozen?”

Pina’s sheepish smile made me laugh.

When we got inside I spread a sesame seed bagel with cream cheese. It was as decent an antidote to my fiery lunch as I was going to find. Pina looked after her toilette and reunited with what I hadn’t lost of her property. Then she went to say hello to Roscoe and, from the next room, I could hear the enthusiasm in the parrot’s voice: “Pina, Pina, Pina, where you beena? Charlie is lost without you.”

Was I lost? Am I lost?

Pina and I walked across the street to The Patch to get some vegetables for dinner. She was shocked to see that the fields have been plowed under since she’s been here. The shed that sells vegetables will close soon until late spring. Gus, the old fellow who sits on a folding chair atop a fat pillow and weighs the produce, saw us walk in and said, “Charlie, did you hear what happened to the rooster?”

I told him I hadn’t.

“Gumbo got him. The very dog who’s job it is to protect the chickens from foxes and other creatures of the night, snaps the rooster’s neck. How do you like that?”

“That sounds biblical.”

“Well, it was light’s out, is what I heard,” Gus said, grinding what was left of his teeth, which is his habit.

The Chicken house, at the far end of the property, is a fairly recent addition to the farm. As a matter of fact, I’ve yet to see eggs for sale at The Patch. I could hear the rooster from my bedroom but his crows were distant and charmed me into thinking I lived in an actual country place. Apparently, Gumbo wasn’t charmed.

“I know how Gumbo feels,” Gus said. “I listened to that damn rooster all day long. I could have rung his neck. Maybe Gumbo read my mind. Hey, it’s a dog eat rooster world.”

I made a note to save that line for Sally.

Pina, surprisingly literal, asked, “The dog didn’t actually eat the rooster?”

“No, just snapped his throat. Nobody would eat a rooster.”

Pina, relieved, started to gather onions and squash. That and a few malformed potatoes were all that was left for sale.

I watched Gus rise off his chair into a hovering squat as he fluffed the pillow under his butt. “Had a lady come in here last week, Charlie. Get this—she passes gas like I’m not even here. Be one thing if it were a little toot, but this was a serious blast and noxious as can be. I must ask myself seven times a day, what are people thinking? Personally, I think it’s the virus. It’s got everybody distracted. My view: it’s either going to kill me or I’m gonna spend the rest of my life dodging it.”

“Hope you’re wrong, Gus.”

“Wrong? How can I be wrong?” Gus went back to grinding his teeth.

A voice, from outside the shed, called: “Hey, neighbors.” I turned to see Vince, standing in a small line. He looked smug in fancy striped pants, dangling a string bag as if he was on his way to a Paris street market. I’ve never been a violent man, but I wanted to slug him.

”Hear about the rooster?” Vince asked.

“Just did,” I said.

Pina tried to stay hidden behind the squash.

“Given all the old timers around here,” Vince said, still with the shit-eating grin on his face, “that rooster was the only dude in the neighborhood getting his at will.”

That was enough for me. I walked out of the shed and stepped close to Vince. He must have known what was coming because he stepped back, out of the line. I threw one punch, an improvised right hook, which squared up well on his jaw. He went down in a flash and rolled onto his side. A woman in line started screaming. “You can’t do that. You can’t do that. You can’t do that.” But I did, and wasn’t feeling any worse for it.

Vince made no effort to get up nor did I offer to help. He called up to me, “Loser, loser,” but I didn’t feel like a loser.

Pina had come outside. Horrified, she looked at Vince on the ground and me rubbing the sore knuckles of my right hand. “See you at home,” I said, not sure, after I’d become a bully, whether or not she would join me.