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"Sometimes my grandparents do."

"Maybe that's the way all artists, creative people are. You're the first girl I knew who does anything creatively, seriously creative, I mean. I'm sorry. I don't mean to be so personal."

"Yes, you do," I said. Then I smiled when he thought I was angry. "It's all right. I can't answer everything about myself because I don't know the answers yet myself."

His eyebrows rose, and he nodded.

"I like that," he said. "I think that's pretty smart. I think it's true for me as well. Maybe it's not as true as it is for you, but nevertheless, I like the idea that we're still making discoveries about our own identities. We get so much pressure on us at our age, don't we? What do you want to be? What do you like? Why are you interested in this or that? It's almost as if we should have our whole lives laid out like . . . like that damn assembly line. I know my parents have plans for me that might not exactly be my own."

Speaking of his parents, I wondered what they would say to him when they found out he had been seeing me, especially his mother, who had been so unnerved and disturbed about what my mother had done in her house. Wouldn't she think I'm bringing all that back?

I suppose I'll find out soon enough, I thought as we pulled into the Doral House driveway.

"Thanks for the ride home," I said.

He looked up at the house.

"What about your promise?"

"What promise?"

"To show me the attic, your art studio?"

"You really want to see that?"

"Very much," he said.

"Okay."

He shut off the engine and followed me into the house.

"My grandmother is still at work," I said. "My grandfather won't be home for another hour probably," I added, and he looked like that relaxed him.

I watched him take in everything.

"I knew this house would be interesting. The ceilings aren't that high, but the rooms are big. They didn't make ceilings high in those days because it was hard and expensive to heat the rooms," he explained. "Wow, that fireplace looks like it goes back a century," he muttered when he looked into the living room. "This is really a historical property."

I had to laugh at his enthusiasm. "You're not too far off. Sometimes my grandmother treats it as if it was a museum," I told him. "This way."

I led him up the stairs to the short stairway to the attic. Before I opened the door, I hesitated. For a moment I felt as if I were possibly betraying someone, betraying a secret to be kept under lock and key. I hardly knew Craig really, but something in me was so eager for his companionship and affection that I was willing to do it. Was that selfish? Would I be punished?

"Something wrong?" he asked, seeing my hesitation.

I shook my head and opened the door.

"Pretty nice," he said as soon as he entered. "I guess it's been changed a lot." He sounded a little disappointed about that. Was he expecting to find it exactly as it had been when my mother hid out here?

"Yes, completely," I said.

He walked about, looking at my pictures and then pausing at the one I had started depicting my mother at the window.

"Is this a self-portrait?"

"No," I said. He studied what lines were there and looked at me and then at the window.

"It's supposed to be your mother? Up here?"

"Yes," I admitted. I actually looked about, studying the corners, thinking I was being watched, heard, revealing a secret.