At some point he said, real quiet, “I went out to the cemetery in ’99.” I didn’t say anything. He said, “Stood there a while. Almost called you from the truck.” And I told him the truth, which was that I’d done the exact same thing one Father’s Day and chickened out in the same spot. We’d been close that whole time. Just two stubborn old fools circling each other.

“We’re idiots, Wayne,” I said.

“Always were,” he said.

That was it. That was as close to sorry as either of us got, and somehow it was enough.

So that’s where I am now. We’ve got maybe a handful of years left between us, if our hearts hold, and I’m not wasting another Sunday being right. I still can’t get used to his voice on the phone. But last week he hung up the way Daddy used to, before I could. “Don’t be a stranger,” he said. Thirty-seven years too late, and I still had to sit down.