Tim Holt, a book editor X befriended that year, was the only Big Bar regular who didn’t quite belong. He arrived each Friday at five to attend to his customary three martinis as he read through a stack of book submissions. The bar was nearly empty at that time—quiet enough to read for an hour, then busy enough to distract him from all those desperate pages. Holt noticed the cheap paperbacks X kept in her back pocket and started bringing her books from New Directions, his employer, gifts she countered with shaking larger drinks, the runoff served in a tumbler on the side. I spoke to Holt by phone, as he’d retired and moved to the Western Territory.*