[He sits there another minute, watching the waves, thinking of the upwelling of irrepressible emotions that had convinced him earlier in the week to Beek something like do you think no one's come for us because they're happier we're gone, the lingering memories of the week before, the ache of wanting things he can't have and can only abbreviate in snippets and games and whimsy —

And before he can think better of it, he snatches up the to-go cup he'd brought with him and takes a deep, profound gulp.

Refreshing and sparkling, with a lemony zing.]

I wrote it for a girl. About a girl. You've seen her — she was in that memory of mine you witnessed in days past. It's not just that I miss her. It's that for some reason, for days upon days now, I can't get her off my mind. I know precisely the jests she would laugh at if she were here to hear them and the rejoinders she would offer in return and no one here comes close to comparing to it. She's a devil for impressions — does a picture-perfect one of me, for all that she looks and sounds nothing like me. And it's not as though I've never gone long lengths of time without her or even that I've any sort of claim to her outside of our friendship but for some reason I just can't...I can't stop...

[Three guess what he just drank. And what he's drinking more of, for good measure.]

I wrote it with her in mind because she would like that. She likes to keep things, to consider them hers. And I would frankly prefer to die again before she ever heard a note of it, and I said you wouldn't want it to be about you because I know you, and once you hear it you'll think so too. You'll be glad it's not.

[He says, even as he picks up the mandolin.]