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“The rug shifted.”

“The wall and I have formed a support group.”

A horn gave one short, polite beep outside.

Josie.

Excitement came through me so clean and bright that I laughed.

Not smiled. Not made the smaller, professional sound I used when another person was funny. I laughed and pulled Cash toward the door with me.

He let himself be pulled.

“Shoes,” he said.

I looked down at my bare feet.

Then back at him.

He held up my boots.

The man had planned for variables.

I loved him beyond reason.

***

Josie came through the door carrying a stuffed Hereford calf under one arm and enough colored pens to supply a county school, while Boone followed with two metal lunch boxes and the solemn expression of a man transporting donor organs.

“I brought options,” she said.

The pens were contained in three zippered cases, one canvas roll, and a battered veterinary drug-company tote bag. Butterbean sat over her forearm, his plush black-and-white face pointed toward the small room.

I stepped aside. “You may have brought the entire category.”

“She left some,” Boone said.

Josie glanced up at him. “The glitter pens leak.”

He nodded as if this had been a discussion with operational consequences.

Cash took one of the lunch boxes. “What did you pack, Boo?”

“Food.”

“Strong menu.”

Boone looked at him.

Cash opened the latch.

Inside were apple rabbits, cheese cut into stars, crackers, grapes halved lengthwise, and two small sandwiches wrapped in waxed paper. Each item occupied its own section. Nothing touched anything else.

Cash stared into the box.

Then at his brother.

“You cut stars.”