***
I had lived there until I was 14.
Then my parents died in a car accident, and I entered foster care. Strangers packed our house while I sat in a county office clutching a trash bag of clothes.
I never returned.
I had lived there until I was 14.
"I knew a guy," I said. "Quiet. Dark hair."
"Carl," Mr. Baron muttered.
"No."
The denial came too quickly.
The Carl I remembered was the quiet young man who lived with his grandfather and repaired bicycles behind their house.
The man I married had laughed easily and argued over books.
"I knew a guy."
Mr. Baron lowered himself into the chair across from me.
"Carl lost both parents when he was seven," he said. "Arthur raised him."
I remembered Arthur's cracked hands and gentle voice.
I remembered bringing him soup when he caught the flu because my mother said nobody should eat alone while sick.