That was the whole report. That was all any of us ever got from her. Thirty-four years of nights, and that was what came home. One sentence over cold eggs.
I had eaten my cereal and gone outside to build a snow fort.
“A month,” the sheriff said finally. “Nights. Starting tonight. And if Kim tells me you so much as sighed, you’re finished.”
“Yes, sir.”
The door of the red pickup opened then.
Walt Brandt walked with a hitch. One hip moved a beat behind the other, the way it would for the rest of his life. He was a lean man in a seed cap and work boots, and he didn’t look at his son first.
He walked right past him to my mother.
“Shirley.”
“Walt. You’re walking good.”
