fashion show, he intended to bake in the backyard.

“Well,” he said, about ten o’clock. “The old house seems different tonight, doesn’t it?”
“Yes.”
“Good to have the cricket gone. Really had us going there.”
“Yes,” she said.
They sat awhile. “You know,” she said later, “I sort of miss it, though, I really sort of miss it. I think I’ll do something subversive so they’ll put it back.”

“I beg your pardon?” he said, twisting a piece of twine around a fly he was preparing from his fishing box
“Never mind,” she said. “Let’s go to bed.”
She went on ahead. Ten minutes later, yawning, he followed after her, putting out the lights. Her eyes were closed as he undressed in the semi-moonlit darkness. She’s already asleep, he thought.

The End