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  “We were just fooling around,” he repeated.

  “That’s what the other boys said, too.”

  “Mrs. Adams,” Janelle said coldly, “I’m getting the feeling you think my son’s not telling the truth.”

  The counselor didn’t answer.

  Janelle stood. “Come on, Bennett.”

  “Ms. Decker—”

  “I’m taking my son home. If you have any further concerns, please feel free to call me.” Janelle gestured at Bennett, who didn’t move fast enough to suit her. “Let’s go. Now.”

  In the car, he said nothing while Janelle counted to ten, then twenty, then another ten while she figured out what to say. “What’s going on?” was all she could finally come up with.

  “Nothing.”

  She thought of the missing hats, the dirt and scrapes. “Are you being bullied?”

  “No!”

  “You can tell me.” She had to swallow hard to get the lump out of her throat. “If they’re bullying you, Bennett, I’ll talk to the school—”

  “No,” he insisted. “Mom, don’t. It’s fine. We were just fooling around, I told you. It’s fine.”

  She said no more into she’d pulled into the driveway and turned off the ignition, but made no move to get out of the truck. “If something is going on, you know you can talk to me about it, don’t you?”

  He shrugged and got out of the vehicle. Janelle followed him to the back door, pausing to toe off her shoes, but her head went up at the sound of Bennett’s startled cry.

  “Mom!”

  Heart dropping into her stomach, Janelle ran into the family room to find a chair overturned, Nan and Bennett nowhere to be found. They were both in the kitchen, Nan standing over a flaming pan on the stove. She backed away, eyes wide, as Janelle pushed past her to shove the pan off the burner. She twisted the knob to turn off the gas, but the flames didn’t disappear. Oil sloshed as she grabbed the pan and turned to dump it in the sink. Nan cried out, but Janelle couldn’t focus on her—she had to find the baking soda. Minutes later she’d dumped an entire box on the mess in the sink, dousing the flames.

  The kitchen reeked, and everything was very, very quiet.

  “Oh,” Nan said. “I’ve made a mess.”

  There was the briefest second when Janelle imagined herself turning around and walking out the door. Getting in her truck. Driving away.

  She didn’t.

  “Bennett. Upstairs. Take a shower. Change your clothes. Put your dirty clothes in the basket and put it in the hall. Do your homework, and no games.” Bennett ducked away without protest, while Nan gave Janelle a trembling smile. To Nan, she said, “I’ve told you before, you need to let me handle the cooking.”

  “You weren’t here,” Nan accused. “I woke up and you weren’t here.”

  “I left you a note.”

  Nan hesitated, shoulders hunched. She looked shrunken, diminished. “I didn’t read it. I didn’t...remember, honey. That you were supposed to be here. I woke up and was hungry for some fried potatoes. I didn’t remember you and Bennett.”

  Janelle could think of no answer to that but words she didn’t believe. “It’s going to be fine. Everything’s okay.”

  NINETEEN

  JANELLE WAS MAKING a list.

  Normally, she wasn’t the list-making sort. That had never meant she was unorganized—she’d needed to be on top of her game in the real estate business—just that she’d never been the kind who gained satisfaction from checking things off on a to-do list.

  This house, though, needed a list. And how. Not just the usual sort, cataloging the amenities—the built-ins, the original woodwork, the hardwood floors that could be gorgeous if refinished. But also a list of the upgrades and repairs that the house would need before it could go on the market.

  She didn’t want to make the list. Every item she wrote in her notebook was one more reminder that things were changing—had to change. No choice about it. She could refuse to get working on any of them, but it wouldn’t make a difference.

  The problem was not just the number of problems she found as she went around the house, checking light switches and outlets and fixtures, but the cost of it all. Everything came down to money, in the end. As Mr. Tierney had said, it always came down to money when there wasn’t enough of it.

  She peeked in on Nan, napping in her bed, before dialing Joey at work. He cut her off before she could do more than begin to describe the bulk of the work she thought needed to be done. He didn’t mean to be rude, she was sure, but still the brusqueness irritated her.

  “How much do you think it’ll be? For the hot water heater and the dishwasher?”

  “I haven’t really done any pricing yet. I’m just trying to get things organized, put in priority.” She paused. “It would be much nicer if we had a working dishwasher sooner rather than later. Same with the hot water heater. Right now I can get through one shower and one load of laundry—”

  “The washer’s new,” he said. “We bought it for her just last year.”

  The inside of Janelle’s cheek was already sore, but she bit it, anyway. “There’s nothing wrong with the washer. It’s the hot water heater. And about the rest...the big ticket items should be taken care of first. Someone might want to buy a house with outdated light fixtures or lovely wooden floors hidden under old and ugly carpet, but they’re not going to make a good offer on one without updated appliances.”

  “What’s the matter with the carpet?”

  Oops. Land mine. “It’s out of style and worn, that’s all. I pulled up a corner to see what sort of subflooring was under there, and—”

  “It’s hardwood. When I was a kid, it was hardwood, but we paid for Mom to put in carpet for Christmas one year. We all chipped in.”

  Janelle had never known the house without the burnt-orange shag carpet, so that Christmas must’ve been a long time ago. “We might want to consider ripping it out....”

  “I don’t think so. No, I don’t think anyone will agree to that. If someone wants to buy the house, let them rip it out.”

  Janelle wasn’t going to push it. She’d seen people cling to dumber things for longer, and for stupider reasons than sentimentality. “Okay. That’s fine. We can reevaluate it after...when the time comes.”

  “And the rest of it?” he asked after a pause. “Those other things. The problems with the wiring, redoing the back porch steps...how much can we get away with leaving as-is?”

  “I guess that depends on the buyer. And the market. All the things on the list are important to think about,” Janelle said. “Will some of them make a huge difference in whether or not we can sell the house? Probably not. But you never know.”

  She’d been through this a hundred times before. Sellers wanted to get the most money out of their house, and the “you have to spend money to make it” argument didn’t always fly.

  Her uncle sighed heavily. “Let me talk to Deb about it. And I’ll give Marty and Bobby and John a call, too. I’ll get back to you on the dishwasher. Have someone look at the hot water heater, see if you can get it fixed instead of buying new. Listen, I have to get back to work. Give my love to Mom, okay? I’ll shoot you an email with what we’ve decided.”

  “Uncle Joey,” she said tightly. “Listen. I need a working hot water heater that can handle three people living in this house. There are dishes, showers, baths. The laundry alone is...” Janelle sighed and put a hand over her eyes for a moment. “Nan’s incontinent, okay? There are accidents. I need to be able to wash her things in water hot enough to get them really clean.”

  “When we asked you to come out here and take care of her, it was with the understanding that you’d do that. That includes doing her laundry.”

  For a moment, Janelle couldn’t think of how to reply. He’d totally missed the point. “I’m not complaining about doing the laundry. I’m just saying that I had to run a few loads of sheets and towels and other things today, and the hot water heater isn’t—”

  �€