“To think,” he repeated, and she nodded, looking up at him like she was making herself brave, like she was ready to answer anything he might ask her. He could see her pulse flickering in her slender throat, her long dark hair swept up as it always was when she was around the house. But he was too surprised to ask another question.

“I can’t deal with this,” he said. “Not this week. Do you even know what’s going on at the bar? I can’t.”

He gestured at her little piles of clothes and shook his head as if to say this—leaving—was what they promised each other they’d never do. They’d never even joke about it. They were family, thick or thin. And yet.