“Hi. Who is this?” “Come on, stop teasing. This is Carmine.” Oh god. “I wasn’t teasing, Carmine. Did I give you my phone number, Carmine?” Walter walked past the phone, giggling. I put my hand over the receiver. “Stop laughing. Did you give him our phone number?” “I don’t even know our phone number yet.” “Carmine, where did you get this phone number? It’s not even listed.” Here’s the thing I realized about somebody like Carmine who flies a different sky from the rest of us: you can never tell whether he is lying or fooling or honestly mistaken or just very, very lost. “Um, somebody gave it to me,” he said. “Somebody but I can’t remember who.” “You know that’s not at all believable, Carmine, don’t you.” “No,” he said in such a sad little way, like he was defending something dear to him, that I felt momentarily sorry. “I don’t know that at all. I wouldn’t lie to you, Sylvia.” I hated hearing him use my name. I didn’t know why, didn’t know what else he should call me.
