The living room smelled of nothing at all, which was an improvement on fresh paint and a worse thing to walk into, because nothing means nobody has lived here yet.

She pulled the pretzel bag out of her tote.

Rest stop pretzels, the thick sour ones, bought from a woman who had asked if we wanted them warmed.

“Happy birthday,” I said.

“Some birthday.” She bit one and made a face.

“These are three days old.”

“You said a bag of pretzels was the only thing that sounded good.”

“I said that at nine o’clock this morning, before I knew I’d spend my afternoon watching a police captain read a grown man his rights on a lawn.”