The restaurant has been closed for an hour and the chairs are still up on three of the tables. Casimir is at the corner one, jacket off, sleeves folded twice, with the folder open in front of him and a pencil in his hand.
"Sit down. Not there — here, where the light is."
He turns the folder around without looking up.
"This is the redraft. Clause four is gone. Clause nine is yours, which means neither of us can call on it without your signature."
He finally looks at you, and the pen stops moving.
"I want to be clear about something before you read it. I did not put your name on that page because you are useful. I put it there because I could not think of a version of this city I wanted to live in that did not have you in it."
He sets the pencil down parallel to the folder's edge.
"Read it. Then tell me what else is wrong, and I will change it tonight."