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Francisco to live with me.
    Neither of us could afford a home—so. Well—yes. So.
    I remained in Westchester for the entirety of his rehabilitation: I stayed at a Howard Johnson Inn a half mile from the grounds. Each afternoon, when Finn had completed his vague work in the city, he’d take the 5:27 Metro-North to Tarrytown. We’d eat burgers, or chicken fingers, or—once—fish sticks at one of those nameless restaurants that populate the strip malls along the lower Hudson.
    As we folded ketchup-stained wax wrappers in our fists, he’d say, “If I hadn’t missed my train, I would’ve gotten there sooner.”
    I’d tell him, “Oh, Finn. These things just happen.”
    And he’d answer with, “But still.”
    Then, if it wasn’t snowing—or even if it was—we’d walk to see him.
    The recovery center itself was brief and unimpressive: a two-story wing tagged onto the hospital’s administrative hub. An afterthought, if anything, whose thin grey corridors played stage to the choreographed movements of halted walkers and slippered, shuffling feet. It faced directly west, so the individual rooms were flooded with too much light in the afternoons—or, in the mornings, none at all.
    His rehabilitation therapist was a blond woman named Christie, who had a soft, Judy Garland disposition couched within a runner’s sinewy build. She was tireless in her efforts; she’d point to his left hand and say, Now, move these three fingers, good, good, while I wanted to scream, Oh, come on, just lift the damned things. She instructed him in these movements—shifting in bed, sitting up, swinging his legs to one side—and, when he couldn’t accomplish a task on his own, she’d place a hand on the small of his back, guide him through it.
    She taught Finn and me how to handle him and bear his weight.
    â€œThis is called a guard belt,” she said one day, unraveling a strap of milky-grey canvas three inches wide. “Fasten it above his belt line. The top of the belt should hit the bottom of his rib cage.”
    â€œWhat’s the purpose?”
    â€œIt’ll give you something to hang on to.”
    â€œAnd he’ll need to wear it—”
    â€œAlways.”
    He was perched on the bed, facing us, and we talked about him as if he weren’t there.
    â€œWhen you lift him, rope your arms under his and take hold of the belt’s back strap,” Christie said. “Give him a count, then pull him up and into you.”
    We watched as she performed. As she raised him—him, weighing nothing at all—from the bed and into her arms.
    â€œHave him rest against you as you both catch your breath.”
    His head lodged and snuggled between her breasts as she spoke. The corners of his mouth twitched up in a smile.
    I told her, “Christie, maybe show us how you did that again.”
    Finn bit and tore at his nails. He said, “I’m just afraid I’m going to break him.”
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    â€œWhere are you going?” he asks when the match has ended; the Wrecking Belles have taken it by twelve.
    â€œJust upstairs, Dad. To work.”
    â€œWhat if the television stops working again?”
    I look toward the screen. Purple-haired girls are sweaty, high-fiving, hitting helmets as the production credits roll.
    â€œIt’s not broken,” I say.
    â€œAnd you’ll just be upstairs?”
    â€œJust upstairs.”
    Here’s another change: when he first came here—when he was still able to complete a crossword puzzle, when he was still indignant and irritated by California—he wasn’t like this. The idea that his survival hinged on my aid infuriated him. He wouldn’t call for me when he should have: more than once, I found him sprawled in a pile of limbs on the floor, his hand gripped desperately around some table leg or chair or lamp as he tried to