I Got Home From the Oil Rig Two Weeks Early and Found My Eight-Year-Old Son Cooking Dinner for Strangers—The Messages He Never Sent Explained Everything.

I expected Finn to get angry.

Instead he asked where Colby was living now.

I told him the boys were staying with their mother’s sister near Opelousas, where the caseworker said they were getting used to a new routine.

“Do they have a shed there?” Finn asked.

“I don’t know,” I said.

“But there are grown-ups checking to make sure they’re safe.”

He nodded slowly.

“Colby was afraid of Dwight too.”