“Nobody buries anybody today,” I said.

My mother scrambled up.

“Julius, family matters stay inside the family —”

“A woman crying all night for help that never came is not a family matter.” I took a cousin’s phone off the arm of the sofa, and I dialed three numbers, and my mother lunged at my hand, and I turned my shoulder and kept it away from her, and it was already ringing.

Across the room, Rowena had stepped back into the hallway, and she had her own phone out, and she was typing fast.

I saw four words on the screen before she angled it away. He’s already getting suspicious.

Somewhere far off, down the county road, a siren started up.

And my brother, quietly, began to edge toward the back stairs — and I stepped into the middle of the doorway and put myself in his way.

“Nobody,” I said, “goes upstairs.

Nobody touches one single thing in this house until the police are standing in it.”