LENA

The summons came on a Friday.

Not a dinner this time, not the particular and surface-performing form of a family occasion, not the specific and controlled environment of Bridget's table with its fourteen frames and its formal roses and its particular and practiced architecture of a family presenting itself. A summons, in the specific and direct form of my father's assistant calling my phone at nine in the morning and saying Mr. Carter would like to meet with you Saturday at eleven, at the Carter Industries office, and the particular and identifying quality of the Carter Industries office rather than the house told me everything I needed to know...