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and a cheap motel room along the highway. Or just grit my teeth and drive straight home.
    My iPhone rang, shattering the air, causing both Lizzie and me to start. The racket in the kitchen fell silent, as if someone had flicked off a TV set, which I figured they didn’t own, since I’d seen no electric wires running to the house.
    Clutching my purse, I trotted down the stairs, dug out my phone, and saw our home number on the screen. “What’s up, Pops?” I tried to sound nonchalant while my thoughts ricocheted with worries about my father’s health.
    Lizzie hovered nearby. I turned away from her.
    â€œI wanted to see how my favorite girl is doing.” Pops had the hiccups again.
    Could I answer Honest Ed without lying? “I was about to check in.” A half-truth. “How about you?”
    â€œI’d feel better if I knew you were safe.”
    â€œI am. Need me to come home?” I zeroed in on my car, several yards away. “I don’t mind, not in the least.”
    I glanced up at the sky to see clouds drifting across the moon, darkening the landscape. My thoughts twirled back to my childhood. I recalled Pops sitting on the end of my quilt-covered bed reading my favorite book, Goodnight Moon . Then he tucked me in as if I were the most precious child in the world. But I hadn’t felt cherished by my mother. Had Mom ever read to me at bedtime? Not that I could remember. If we bumped into each other on the street, would she and I recognize each other? I liked to think she kept my photo in a frame on her bureau. As a child I’d toyed with this crazy notion: I’d locate my mom, she and Pops would reunite, and we’d live happily ever after. But fairy-tale endings never happen.
    â€œYou know I didn’t want you traveling alone,” he said. “But I have good news. I sold the red minivan and the Ford Explorer, and there’s a couple interested in the yellow Cadi.”
    I heard the wind stirring the bare branches of the hickory tree growing at the side of the Zooks’ house and felt the breeze playing across my cheeks. “That’s good, but you sound tired. I could kick myself for leaving.” What had gotten into me? Should I admit to Pops that I’d called his doctor’s office a few days ago to pry privileged information from an office assistant, an older woman I’d known since childhood who was about to retire? No, I’d get her in trouble, put a blemish on her record.
    â€œIf I could redo this day, I’d be lounging in the living room with you and Ginger,” I said.
    â€œEverything okay?” Tension strained his voice. “Is the Mustang still purring like a pussy cat?”
    â€œWith that exhaust system? Rumbling like a lioness is more like it.”
    He laughed. I enjoyed the sound of it.
    As I said good-bye and slipped the phone into my handbag, I heard an owl’s raspy screech in a distant stand of trees, giving me the shivers. I noticed movement out of my peripheral vision. Lizzie tugged at my jacket sleeve, startling me. My purse flew out of my hand.
    â€œWon’t ya please come inside?” She scooped up the purse and dusted it with her apron. Inhaling the earthy smell of manure, I dreaded to think where my bag had landed.
    â€œHere ya go. Good as new.” She gave it to me, then her arms hung at her sides. “I’ll bet Mamm and Dat were discussing chores, is what they were doing. We have two-dozen Holsteins …” Her eyes had lost their luster and her voice its vivacity.
    Was their argument a dispute about Jeremy’s not doing his share of the milking? Or had I piloted the Mustang too quickly on their dirt driveway? Perhaps they’d heard my tires and beefy exhaust. Or had I walked into an episode of Family Feud ?
    â€œI heard a woman’s voice in the fray, and what sounded like an elderly man’s,” I said.
    â€œMy Mudder ’s parents join us for dinner