We will be there, Jordan wrote, but Percy and I are bringing our own family.
The phone slipped from my fingers, landing with a sharp plastic click on the kitchen floor.
It lay there on the linoleum, the screen glowing upward in the dim morning light.
I stood perfectly still, staring down at the words as the screen slowly faded to black.
I carried the basket of folded laundry up the stairs at four o’clock, wanting the physical work to quiet my mind after the text message from Jordan. The silver sedan with one hundred and forty thousand miles on it sat in the driveway below the hallway window, its hood still warm from the grocery trip that had cost me two hundred and eighty dollars. The house was quiet, the heavy summer air hanging in the upstairs hallway like a damp sheet.
Ethan’s bedroom door was cracked open, showing a slice of his messy desk and the back of his grey hoodie. He was hunched over, his shoulders tense.
