Page 59 of Coram House

My wine goes down the wrong pipe, and I cough a spray of red droplets onto my napkin. “The project,” I say when I can breathe. “You mean, Coram—Sunrise House?”

His brows furrow. “Well, yeah. I’m the largest investor, apart from Bill. Sorry, I just assumed you knew.”

I take this in with a burst of anger but no one to direct it at.

“It’s going to be really cool when it’s done.”

Xander goes on to describe the green roof, the communal gathering spaces, the fire pit. I think of the brochure Stedsan gave me. The good-looking, racially neutral yuppies drinking wine under the shade of trellised vegetables someone else would be caring for. I should have known all that didn’t come from Bill Campbell.

Xander makes a broad gesture—saying something about affordable housing units—and knocks over his wineglass. The red liquid pours into the cracks in the wood, oozing toward me across the table. Xander rushes to soak it up with his napkin. The stain spreads across the white linen.

“The history of Coram House,” I say, because I can’t bring myself to use the wordsunriseagain, “it doesn’t bother you?”

He frowns like he doesn’t understand the question. “Of course it’s terrible,” he says. “But that’s the point—it’s history. We’re building a new future. A quarter of the units are going to be affordable housing and the whole thing will be net-zero. That’s where the name came from. I wanted something the opposite of what it used to be. A new beginning.”

He looks at me, waiting. So I paste on a smile while I think. I mean, he’s not wrong. What would be the best use of that space? To molder away? Become a museum of horrors? But still, it bothers me. It’s not a blank slate.

“Look, I think we can find a way to honor the history while still harnessing its potential,” he says.

I imagine what the plaque will say. Some quote about beauty and suffering probably.After the rain, comes the rainbow.I feel a mad urge to laugh or to throw my wineglass at him just to hear something smash. But I know Cara would be the one cleaning up the mess.

Xander pushes back his chair and gestures for me to follow him. “Come on, I want to show you something.”

I look at the platters of uneaten food—far too much for two people—the ruined napkin, the half-finished bottle of wine that probably costs a week of my salary. I wonder what the hell I’m doing here. Then I get up and follow him.

Xander leads me down a back hall and into a library with matching tartan armchairs and floor-to-ceiling bookshelves. The spines of the books are all arranged by color, so it gives the impression of a wall wrapped in rainbows. A massive coffee table is littered with stacks of photos, newspaper clippings, and a leatherbound notebook. The mess reminds me a bit of my own workspace.

I pick up one of the photos. It’s Lake Champlain. Rich, deep black in the shadows, but the surface of the water has the sheen of mercury. Probably a silver gelatin print. It’s dusty; everything on the table is, as if someone abandoned whatever project this is halfway through.

“I was thinking we could frame these,” Xander says, pointing to the photos. “And hang them throughout the buildings. I figured they’d give the historical flavor.”

I lay aside the landscape and lift another photo. Children sitting in a pew, dressed in dark jackets and dresses.Sunday Service, it says on the bottom. I frown.

“Xander, where did these come from? Father Aubry?”

He shakes his head. “Most of that stuff burned up, I guess. But these are from the right time period.”

The photo isn’t from Coram House at all. It’s a prop. Some picture unearthed at a thrift shop or, more likely, bought online.

“Here, check this out.”

Xander slides a photocopy of a newspaper clipping across the table. A grainy black-and-white photo shows a man in a suit and two children in front of a building, a ribbon stretched across the doors.Orphans open new library wing, says the caption.

“I’m trying to talk the library into giving me the original. They’ve got it framed in some back hallway, where no one can see it. And I figure there’s got to be more stuff like this out there.”

He goes on, but I’m not listening anymore. I hold the photocopy gently, as if it might crumble to dust. The two children in the image are dressed formally. The boy in a dark jacket, the girl in a dress and frilled ankle socks. I would have assumed the photo was from the fifties based on their clothes, but the caption says 1967. No Swinging Sixties here. But it’s not the clothes that have grabbed my attention, it’s the rest of the caption:Mayor Francis J. Cain cuts the ribbon on the new Mary Fletcher Library wing with some help from Elizabeth R. (7) and Thomas U. (8), children of Coram House.

I feel like I’ve been punched in the stomach. The image is grainy. But the boy’s age is right. The year is right. It could be him.Thomas U.A last initial. I grip the paper like someone might try to tear the photocopy out of my hands.

“Can I take this with me?” I ask.

Xander blinks at me. I’ve interrupted him, I realize too late. My mouth is dry, afraid he might say no.

“I’ve been looking for someone—my research—this might help.”

“Of course,” he says, and he looks so genuinely happy, that I feel bad for wanting to throw a glass of wine at him only five minutes before.

“Take anything you need.”

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