Danny's room was tan, then light blue, then white, and once it was yellow with maroon trim, but eventually our parents stopped choosing the colors and sheets to match, even stopped making the trip all the way upstairs to inspect for damage, just had a standing arrangement with Billy the Painter, who came every two months and sang songs about his baby leaving him as he slapped on one more coat of off-white.

The repainting bugged Danny, who said his walls were a blackboard filled with equations, the chips and smudges were markers, like tape on a gym floor, to let the athlete know where to stand, where to run, where to jump. Every paint job meant starting over. "But I'm tough," he said. "This time next week, those walls will be as good as ever."

When Billy finished, he'd show Danny around the room as if he was a tour guide and Danny the visitor, and then he'd say, "Go to it, kid," and he'd wink. "And you, young lady," he'd say to me, "Go do your homework."

Our parents tried sending Danny away to camp, not to circus camp but to computer camp, in the hope he'd develop new interests. I stayed home that summer, working as a lifeguard at the town pool and eavesdropping on Miriam's end of the phone calls reporting that Danny spent his time, except for meals, sequestered in the small closet in his dorm room, making thumping and pounding noises.

And so things continued, and our parents did not wake up one fine morning to find Danny, model son, smiling as he ate his Wheaties and announced his intention to be a doctor, lawyer, engineer.

As the plane takes off I squeeze my armrests and when that doesn't work I pinch the skin just above each of knees, pinch hard, hoping to distract myself enough to prevent an embarrassing physical display. I am earthbound, and most comfortable there. Danny, if he could, would sit on the wing of an airplane as it flew.

When the plane levels out, when I can see the white carpet that is the tops of clouds, I take out an emery board and file my nails. It's a new habit of mine, filing my nails, and is intended to prevent my chewing them. The plane is due in Albany at 5 p.m., Eastern time.

When I see a juggler, I stop. I watch their acts. I've become something of a connoisseur. Lots of them, all of them, can throw things into the air, but only a few have the hands, have juggling in their bones and blood, so that you think if you gaze deeply into their eyes, for long enough, and learn to decipher the signs, you could see constellations swirling.

The bad ones you can spot a mile away, talk, talk, talk, to cover for only three balls, childish patterns.

Danny, I know, is good, one of the best. It's difficult to juggle - even to juggle badly. I've tried. I've been to group clinics, had private lessons, even went, one vacation, to circus camp, where I learned to pile into a toy car with the rest of the clowns, but never have I learned to juggle.

"It's easy," an old boyfriend used to tell me. "It's all in the rhythm." Sometimes, when he was in a good mood, when he'd done well with his act that day and his hat was full, he'd go to the refrigerator and take out three oranges. "Watch," he would tell me, and then, just to show off, he'd close his eyes and still not miss. Then he'd let me stand behind him, my fingers resting lightly on the back of his hands. "Easy," he'd say, and afterwards we'd eat the oranges, which were slightly bruised but still cold. Then he left, made it to Broadway, to Johnny Carson, and to a blonde Rockette. But I swear that, sometimes, I could see the planets in his eyes. And once, during an unguarded moment, stars being born. I swear.

And he was wrong. It's hard, hard as anything. I don't have the hands. But life has its rewards, and yields them from time to time. To be able to watch, that is enough.

The plane lands, a smooth landing. I rent a car at the Albany airport, drive to Troy and drive around, looking hard at houses that look like dirty dishwater, wondering about the lives of the people who live in them and wondering if one of them is where Danny used to live. I'm headed for Dunkin' Donuts but I half expect to see Danny standing on a corner, trashbags full of his belongings piled at his feet, which makes no sense, as he owns a beat-up pick-up.

When I get to Dunkin' Donuts I order coffee with extra cream and extra sugar, ask for Danny, and sit in a booth with a view of the swinging door that leads to the kitchen. Danny comes out of that door a few minutes later, and he's not wearing a big white chefs hat like a miniature cloud, the way chefs on television do, and that's a little disappointing. He pauses, talks to the girl behind the counter, who hands him two napkins full of chocolate glazed donuts, and then he's standing next to the booth.

"Hannah," he says. "How pleasant. What a surprise." He slides into the booth, and puts the napkins full of donuts in the middle of the table.

He is pissed off.

Now that I'm here I remember that I've never quite known how to talk to this man who is Danny, so I grab a donut and keep my eyes mostly on the table. He's grown a frizzy orange beard that sticks out of his face horizontally and makes him look slightly goat-like, and his tan hair is shaggy and covered by a greasy baseball cap that used to be blue.

"Doesn't food get stuck in that?" I ask, waving vaguely at the beard.

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