Tue, 11 August

Things still on the table: One lunch plate, pushed aside but not removed. A menu, open, unread, facing nobody. A wine glass two-thirds full — which is to say, one-third empty, which is to say, nobody is counting. The waiter's elbow, caught in the frame's right edge, bearing the next thing. A coat, still half-on, one shoulder. The other shoulder. Things no longer on the table: Whatever made the morning feel like a test. The distance between two people at the start of a long lunch. The effort of it. Time, briefly — its usual pressure lifted, set down somewhere near the coats.