Where It Was First Said

You sit at the other end of the bench. Overhead the parakeets talk. Hello, they say. Come here. Pepper.

The man turns his notebook so you can see. It is a map of the lake trail, a ring, with small crosses along it and a phrase written beside each. Where it was first said, he says, and taps one.

Good morning, says a bird, and he finds the phrase on his map and ticks it.

Then another bird says: Ask me in ten years. The man looks at you, and at the map. I don't have that one, he says. Where was it said?

East of the tracks, you tell him. He draws a cross at the edge of the page, off the ring, where there is room.