Don’t force it.

If it sticks, lift up on the knob just a hair before you turn.”

“I’ll remember that.”

“Write it on the inside of the door,” he said.

“People forget.”

The rain started while I was loading the box into the trunk, and by two o’clock it was steady enough to hear against the glass.

My father had the old lock off the front door and laid out on a dish towel before I had even hung up my coat.

“Nineteen years,” he said, holding the brass up to the light from the window.