"So. You're opening this a year from now, and if everything goes the way I've got it planned, I'm sitting right there with you, and Danny's there, and I'm making a fool of myself. And if everything doesn't go the way I planned — well. We'll get to that.
"First the car. The car's yours. I know you don't want it. I know you think it's that thing your father did instead of coming in to dinner. Fair enough. But it's yours. I put it in your name in November, the title's in my desk, second drawer, under the checkbook. The reason it's yours is because I know where you want to go, kiddo, and that Honda of yours isn't going to make it over the Rockies. It's barely going to make it over the Lorain Road bridge.
"I see you, you know. Since you were little. Every movie on TV, you'd sit there through the credits, every name, like you were reading the box scores. Makeup by. Special makeup effects by. You'd say the names out loud. You think I didn't notice. And then you went and got the job at Channel Six, and you're good at it, everybody says so, and you stayed. And I know why you stayed. You stayed because your mother and me are getting old and Theresa's got the baby, well, Joey's not a baby anymore, and you thought somebody ought to stick around.
"Lena. Listen to me. I'm going to say this once on tape and then I'm going to deny it. Nobody asked you to stay. I didn't. Your mother didn't. You decided that all by yourself, and you're wrong. Go. Okay? When they call, and they're going to call, go.
"Now the other thing." A pause. The basketball crowd roared. "Doc Petrakis says my ticker's got a hitch in it. I had a little episode at the school in October, in the shop, I sat down on a sawhorse for a while and some kid got me a Coke from the machine. It's nothing. It's a thing they give you pills for. I haven't told your mother because it's Christmas and she worries, and I'll tell her after the holidays, I swear to God I will. But I'm fifty-five, and I'm not stupid. So in case I'm not there when you open this—
"In case I'm not there, Danny's going to finish the car. The steering box is in his present. Don't let him tell you it's complicated, it's two afternoons. He's the only person I'd let under that hood. And you be nice to him, Lena-bean. I mean it. I know you never liked him much. I know you thought he took something of yours. But you had a whole house, honey. You had a mother and a sister and a room with purple walls and a lock on the door. He was a kid who needed a garage. That's all. That's all it ever was. There's room in a heart for more than one kid. That's the secret. Nobody tells you that, but it's true.
"Okay. Your mother's yelling about the leftovers. I love you. I'm proud of you. Open Danny's tape next, and don't listen to the part where I talk about you, it's embarrassing. Merry Christmas, kiddo."
A clunk. The basketball game. Then the click, and the hiss of empty tape running on and on.