“You carry things like a soldier.”

“Army.

Seven years of it.”

“That’s a long time to stand up straight.” He wiped his hands on his apron.

“I’ll bring you something in a minute.

You look like a woman who skipped her lunch.”

The metal lockbox was in the third box, underneath my old uniforms, with the brass key still taped to the lid right where I had taped it the week I left Fort Carson.

I hadn’t opened it in four years.