I stood up, smoothed the skirt of my coat, and walked down the steps toward Lynn’s idling car without turning around.

The yellow porch light was already burning when we turned into the driveway on Oak Ridge Drive at four o’clock.

Biscuit began barking behind the kitchen door the moment the engine stopped, his front paws thumping against the wood.

I unlocked the back door, and Biscuit squeezed through the gap, pressing his golden head straight into Greg’s legs.

Greg dropped his winter coat over the back of a kitchen chair and knelt on the cold tile floor, burying his face in the dog’s neck.

“Hey, boy,” Greg whispered.