James turned his face skyward, squinting up at the pyramid of glass that seemed so distant, searching in the wash of light from the chandeliers for the secret, far-off glimmer of a star. I thought of the night of the party, when he and I had stood together in the garden, peering up at the heavens through a jagged hole in the treetops. Our last isolated, innocent moment; the stillness that precedes the blows and billows of a storm.