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Ashore,” but Dan was in the bathroom and missed the whole sordid tune, and by the time he returned everyone was mechanically rolling their fists around to “Wheels on the Bus.” They had survived the Michaels, hadn’t bumped into a big, noisy one for over a year, seemed to have found their most solid footing, and when the occasional Michael was mentioned on television, or when their waiter at Chili’s wore the vulgar name on his name tag, their world did not lurch to an awkward halt and the piece of them that had already perished a thousand times did not perish again. They, Carrie and Dan both, had pulled through. It had taken six years and one baby girl but they’d made it, together, they’d weathered the storm of Michael, and they were going to be okay.
    And then out of the blue one day late in February—no birthday or holiday in sight, no earthly reason—Dan’s mother sent Chloe a package with a stuffed armadillo puppet inside and Chloe snatched the animal from the box and hugged it and exclaimed: “Michael! Michael!”
    It was early evening, the best time of the day, the sudden, painless shedding of work and preschool complete, the familiar comfort of worn couch cushions and the temperamental garbage disposal. They were in the kitchen, Chloe and Dan at the table (Chloe kneeling on the chair) and Carrie standing at the stove, stirring something in a pot—she couldn’t have said what it was in that moment, not if someone had had a knife to her throat.
    â€œHow do you know that’s his name?” Dan asked, in the most nonchalant tone he could muster.
    â€œMichael! It’s Michael!” Chloe said, joyfully, bouncing on her knees. She stuffed her hand into the hole in the armadillo’s belly, wiggled her fingers into its head, then thrust it toward her father’s face. “I’m Michael,” she said, in her armadillo voice, which was her voice for every animal, a low monotone with a hint of a speech impediment.
    â€œIs he on TV?” asked Carrie from the stove, a panicky, hopeful lilt to her voice, as if she were calling up the stairs in an empty house. Dan looked briefly in her direction, but his eyes were not able to land on his wife. His glance began darting uncontrollably around the room, fly-like. It had been years since this had happened and he was furious and humiliated to find it happening to him now, in front of his daughter, as if she’d notice, as if anyone but him had any idea.
    Dan looked at his shoes. This was the only thing that helped.
    â€œWhat d’ya mean, TV?” Chloe asked. She tried to spin the armadillo around on her finger and it flew off her hand and skittered across the floor to Carrie’s feet. Chloe leapt up to retrieve it.
    â€œDoes he have a TV show?” Dan asked, looking up, his eyes back under his own power. “Have you seen him on some—”
    â€œNo,” Chloe said, smacking a kiss on her mother’s knee with the fuzzy, twisted mouth of the puppet. “He’s just here, in our house. He’s mine. He’s—”

    â€”goddamn Michael the goddamn armadillo, Carrie thought, standing in the backyard, smoking her cigarette. An armadillo! Really? What a stupid animal! Who sent a child an armadillo? Who would even make a stuffed armadillo, ugly and scuttling, awkwardly prehistoric? She took a deep drag and let it out as slowly as she could. She allowed herself one cigarette in the backyard every night, after Chloe was asleep and Dan was watching TV or doing the dishes. She also allowed herself to eat a small Baggie of gummie bears before lunch, at her desk. She allowed herself to sleep late on Sundays. She allowed herself to be ten minutes late for work, as long as she was thinking about work (and thus, more or less, working) during the ten-minute drive to her office. She allowed herself to buy the expensive toilet paper. She allowed herself to take showers that