“Just don’t burn through your strength before winter sets in.”

“I won’t,” Caroline said.

She carried her canvas tool bag out to the curb where Paige was waiting in the small delivery van.

By nine fifteen that night, the small flat on Elmwood Avenue was quiet except for the hum of the refrigerator in the corner.

Caroline set the envelope containing twelve hundred dollars on the kitchen table beside a printed set of crib assembly instructions she had taken from the clinic counter.

She pulled Grant’s corporate letter out of her coat pocket and laid it flat beside the instructions.