“You are company.”

Mom laughed for the first time all day.

I returned to my house alone, armed with a list of what it would take to make the ground-floor room safe again.

Lucas was still in front of the television.

PART 5: What the Deed Actually Said

Our home was not a trophy handed to Lucas by some invisible authority.

We had purchased it eight years earlier with a down payment assembled from both our savings and a modest gift from Marian after my father’s death.

We were both on the deed and both named on the mortgage.