Ellie has left H&C. Her student visa was running out, and she wants to travel with her friends to Mexico, so the Friday before last was her final day. We had a little gathering at the oustide table where people smoke, with Tiramisu and apple cider and champagne. Lara had two glasses. Later, after the party had broken up and we were alone together, she went into an impassioned riff about Kay. “He thinks he knows everything but he doesn’t!” Which is true. Kay’s heart is in the right place, but he has that white-boy arrogance that comes with being promising, well-off, caucasion, male, and in one’s twenties. All I could offer was the lame comment that he would grow out of it. I’m not positive about that.

We miss Ellie. She took good care of faxes and filing and she was pleasant to have around, with her rippling accent, her easy-going nature. Watching her was like watching a sailboat bouncing forward in the waves of an ocean the sailor knows is safe. If the boat overturns, well, the boat overturns and there’s nothing to worry about but wet clothes and a slight delay in the journey. What in Kay comes across as arrogance is, in Ellie, the luxury of time.

But she’s gone, nobody is checking the faxes regularly, and the supplies are once again falling into chaos. Lou, the afternoon girl hired to fill that vacuum, is nice but only part-time. She’s dark, rather rangy, and about Kay’s age, well-read, opinionated, and eager to talk about things. She and Kay get along like a house afire.