“Honey,” I said, stepping toward her.

Sadie stood up so hard her chair screeched across the linoleum.

“It’s totally fine, Mom,” she said.

She smacked the edge of the blue plastic sewing box with her palm.

The box flipped over and sent dozens of safety pins clattering across the table and onto the floor.

She didn’t stop to pick them up.

She walked past me into the dark hallway, leaving the blue dress crumpled on the kitchen chair, and went to her room with her head down.

At two o’clock Sunday afternoon, the sound of a gray Ford diesel idling in the gravel driveway brought me out to the side porch.