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“You sound pretty confident. But if it needs oiling or something we can go back to that hardware store where you got the Brasso and—”

“It will work,” Charlie said, sounding slightly irritated. “You thought the bike was old and crummy, butitworked.”

“Okay,” she said.

“I can’t set it up out here,” he said. “I have to do it inside. If it rained and it was blowing it could get all wet.”

“What about your bedroom?”

“It’s too small. There’s a lot of track here.”

It was a big house and just the two of them. Annie wondered whether she should let him take over the dining room. But then she hit on a better idea.

“If you don’t mind sharing space with me, what about the studio? You could put it on the floor.”

Charlie cocked his head at an awkward angle, considering. “Maybe...”

It was as big a space as any, and her worktable only took up a fraction of it. There was plenty of natural light, and she didn’t know how much work she was actually going to do while they were here, so he’d mostly have the room to himself.

“Okay,” Charlie said. “Will you help me get it all up there?”

She did. Once they had everything moved, and Annie had tossed the empty Tide box down into the basement, she came back up and offered to help Charlie put the track together.

“That’s okay,” he said. “I want to do it by myself.”

“You sure? Because it would be fun, a project we could work on to—”

“No,” he said firmly, already on his hands and knees, attaching a straight length of track to a curved one, inserting the end pins from one into the openings on the other.

Annie felt as though one of those pins had pierced her heart. She was willing to bet if John were here, Charlie would want his assistance. Who said trains had to be aguy thing? She’d have been on the floor, helping him put this layout together, in an instant if he’d let her.

“Okay, then,” she said, trying to keep the hurt out of her voice. The last thing she wanted to do was make Charlie feel guilty.

She turned, walked out of the room, and left him to it.

Her hurt feelings aside, the discovery of the trains could not have come at a better time. The day before, Charlie had seemed restless and asked twice about whether his friend Pedro could come up from New York for a visit. Annie had offered that old parental standby: “We’ll see.”

The truth was, as much as she wanted Charlie to have a good summer here, she did not want Pedro, or any other friend of Charlie’s, coming for any extended period of time. Two boys running around made a lot more noise than one, plus there would be extra meals to organize, a different daily routine. Annie felt selfish thinking this way, and if Charlie really wanted his friend to visit, she would find a way to make it happen.

But Charlie’s restlessness had been cured with the discovery of the box full of trains. She supposed the novelty might wear off, and he’d return to asking again whether Pedro could come up, so Annie, as John used to say, would jump off that bridge when the time came. For the moment she would just enjoy this special time, having Charlie all to herself.

She went into the kitchen and resumed work on her puzzle. Managed to find all the pieces she needed to make “Yo.”

Charlie came down long enough to eat a grilled cheese sandwich, then bolted back up the stairs. While he was on his last bite, dipping his sandwich into a puddle of ketchup, Annie asked, “How’s it going?”

“Almost there,” he said, and dashed.

About an hour later, Annie heard a sound. Actually, it was more of a vibration at first, the ceiling above her humming. There was no carpet in the studio. A train running on tracks set up directly on hardwood was bound to make a racket.

She came out of the kitchen and stood at the bottom of the stairs and listened.

Chuffchuffchuffchuffchuff

Her heart swelled. Charlie was right. It worked.

Chuffchuffchuffchuffchuff

She smiled. She wanted to see what he’d accomplished. Pausing halfway up the stairs, she heard another sound drift down to her.