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about camping out sometime this week?” she asked as they sat together eating grilled cheese sandwiches and a fresh tomato-cucumber salad.
    Max bobbed his head excitedly as he turned to his cousin with an imploring look. “Can we?”
    Jonathan glanced between Millicent and me, as if he was trying to figure out if this was yet another trick. I kept watch out of the corner of my eye, trying to act nonchalant. I thought it was a grand idea when Millicent proposed it to Alex and me the night before, but if I endorsed it I knew Jonathan would reject it on principle.
    “I don’t know, Millicent,” I said as I nursed a cup of herbal tea at the bar. “We have two weeks of work to catch up on. That’s why he’s staying here, isn’t it?”
    “Oh, come on,” she cajoled with a knowing glint in her eyes. “It’s just one night. And I think the fresh air would do the boys good. We’re all getting a little stir crazy. Right, guys?”
    Max again bobbed his head and Jonathan sent me a steely, defiant glance. “I think it’s a great idea, Millicent,” he said.
    “Then it’s settled,” Millicent decided with a clap of her hands. “We’ll dig out the tent from the garage. Lots of stuff in there from when your father and your uncle stayed here as children, so I’m sure we’ll find some camping gear.”
    I suppressed a smile. Millicent was a pro. Jonathan’s ears perked up the minute he realized that his father had stayed here as a child, something I don’t think he had truly considered before. He was curious despite himself, and she knew it. She turned to me. “We could really use another pair of hands,” she suggested.
    “Fine,” I agreed begrudgingly, playing my part to a tee. After lunch we all headed to the six-car garage at the north end of the house. There was Alex’s work truck, a motorcycle and a rugged family sedan, along with a hybrid car similar to the one I had left behind at Drew’s, only a year older and brilliant pearl white. The rest of the garage was devoted to storage, and we lifted out box after box and bin after bin until we found the ones that were labeled “Fullerton boys,” “Alex,” or “Drew,” tucked back in a forgotten corner.
    I pulled open the first box I came to, a box that had “Drew” written in bold black marker. Inside were relics from the 1980s, including hand-held, battery-operated video games, dog-eared copies of Tolkien novels and even a frayed comic book or two. It was hard to imagine the powerful businessman as a child, especially the awkward geek that these discarded belongings suggested he had been. There were old magic tricks, a frayed rabbit’s foot, action figures and micro cars. I could smell 1985 rise from the musty cardboard box and I tried to picture what Drew must have been like back then. He couldn’t have been much younger than Jonathan was now. Gently I folded the flaps together and set it aside, catching Jonathan’s attention as I did so. He stealthily tried to sneak a peek at his father’s discarded belongings, no doubt as curious as I was about the child he might have been.
    Alex’s box wasn’t quite as nerdy. There was a Swiss army knife, models of horses and an old, fake sheriff’s badge that had “Fullerton” emblazed on it. I unearthed old vinyl 45 records under a cap gun and harmonica, both of which sat atop a crudely crafted homemade kite.
    I pocketed the harmonica, the knife and the sheriff’s badge before I sealed the box back and went for another one.
    Unfortunately there was no camping gear amon g this plethora of memorabilia, and Alex’s gear for a single man or a couple wouldn’t suffice. Millicent suggested that we go shopping, so we all piled into the family SUV and headed into Oxnard, located a half-hour from Alex’s country estate. We spent an hour at an outdoorsman retailer, buying everything we needed for a campout, including tents, sleeping bags, lanterns and cooking equipment.
    By the time we were done, an entire