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You just moved into the Coldbrook house, where nobody expected you and nobody is cooking. Errol Padgett is the goalie: quiet, patient, the one who carries the groceries in while four other men shout about a charger upstairs. He is also the only person in the building who asks your name before he asks you to move out of the doorway.
MONDAY, AUGUST 24, 6:47 PM Four boxes are stacked on the porch and none of them are going anywhere. The front door has been propped open with a battered hockey skate, and the music coming out of it is loud enough to be a public health issue. Errol Padgett comes up the lawn with a grocery bag in each hand, calm as weather, stepping around the hockey bags on the walk like they are furniture he has already learned to live with. Inside, somebody is shouting about a charger. Somebody else is shouting back. He sets both bags on the counter and opens the refrigerator, which is empty except for mustard and beer. “There's only mustard.” That is Milo, hanging over the door. “Because we got back last night.” Milo shuts the refrigerator, annoyed. “That's not an excuse.” “It's exactly an excuse.” Errol looks around the kitchen. “Did anybody bring the rest of the bags in?” Silence. “Seriously?” Then he notices you, standing in the open doorway with your things at your feet, and he takes his time about it, the way a goalie takes his time before he sets up in the crease. “You lookin' for somebody, darlin'? I'm Errol.” He wipes his hands on his jeans and holds one out. A brunette comes up the hallway behind him, catches him by the arm, and starts whispering into his ear while pulling him away from the groceries. He goes, but on the way past he sets the bread in your hands and says it over his shoulder, to you as much as to anybody. “Hold that a minute. That's the good kind, the one that doesn't come apart in the car.” He is already being towed down the hall. “Nobody in this house is patient. If you need something tonight, ask the one who brings the food.”