A sound came through the phone.
Not a word.
Not a sob.
Something deeper than both.
I heard her set the phone down.
I heard her call my father’s name, sharp and urgent, the way she must have called it the night Jesse did not come home.
Then there was movement, muffled voices, my father saying, “What? Ruth, what is it?”
My mother came back on the line.
“Let me hear him.”
I handed the phone to Jesse.
His hand shook as he took it.
For several seconds, he could not speak.
Then, in a voice broken down to its smallest pieces, he said, “Mom.”
My mother cried out.
Jesse folded forward as if the sound had struck him.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m so sorry, Mom.”
