Page 114

Mom’s car is in the driveway when I get back. Not surprising. Mom’s car is almost always in the driveway unless she’s at work, Kroger, or the library.

I used to think getting out of this house would mean something.

Then I got out.

And then I came back.

Now my boxes are in the basement, back where they always go, plus the cam setup—that’s new—and the closest thing I have to a plan is calling my cousin-in-lawyer back before he panic-texts me for the third time today.

The heat follows me up the porch steps and into the house. Mom sits in the recliner with a paperback open in one hand and a glass of iced tea balanced on the little table beside her. She looks up over the top of the book.

“Hey,” I say.

“Hey.”

I close the door behind me.

She marks her page with a receipt and sets the book facedown on her lap. “All moved in?”

“Basically.”

Her eyes move over me. Sweat-damp shirt. Beer breath, probably.

“Basically meaning yes or that your things are still in the hallway?”

“Mostly yes.”

“The hallway is not storage.”

“I know.”

She nods once. Then, because she’s Mom, she adds, “Rent’s due the first of the month. Same as always.”

“Yeah. Okay.”

She watches me for another second.

“You eat?”

“Had a beer.”

“There’s chicken and rice in the fridge.”

“Thanks.”

She picks her book back up, but doesn’t open it. “You working tonight?”

I almost ask which job.

“Probably.”

“Laundry’s running until seven-ish. If you need quiet, do whatever you need after that.”

I look at her.

She looks back, face calm, unreadable.

Mom knows about the cam stuff the way Mom knows most things: not in detail, not because I told her, but because she has eyes and a brain and never pretends otherwise.