I was not prepared for this question. I don’t think I’d been asked it since the age of eight, at any rate. Amy! would have known the answer immediately. It was probably kittens. Or unicorns. But she never would have had this night—she wouldn’t have taken a chance and gone out barefoot to drive a Jeep around a meadow. And I had. “I don’t know,” I said, considering the question. “I’ve always liked owls, I guess.”

“Owls?” he asked. “Really?”

“Yeah,” I said, with a laugh. “But that might just be because I like lollipops. And potato chips. The ones with glasses, I guess. Why?”

“No reason,” he said, backing the car up and turning in the direction of the main house. He gave a little honk, then disappeared down the road, leaving stillness and darkness behind him. I looked up at the house and saw that Roger’s light was back off.

I walked inside, unable to keep a smile off my face. Lucien liked me. He wanted to kiss me. After Michael, and so much time alone, and so much time not connecting, I’d thought that it might never happen again. But it had.

As I headed into my room, I saw my cell lying on top of the perfectly made bed. I picked it up, thinking about Lucien’s mother drying out in some rehab, not wanting him to damage her grass with his creations. My mother had come to see all my shows, until this last one. She’d always brought me flowers. And though it had embarrassed me at the time, I could always hear her cheers, separate from anyone else’s, when we took our curtain call.

I called her cell, pressing in the code to send a message directly. “Hi, Mom,” I said, after the beep. “I, um, just wanted to say hi. We’re in Kentucky. And I’m okay. So you don’t need to worry.” I hung up and looked down at the screen. I had been trying not to think about this, but she probably was worried. So maybe that had helped a little. I went to bed feeling like a small weight had been lifted.

In the morning, when I went downstairs to see if Roger was awake and, if so, whether he had made coffee, I saw something on the front porch and went out to investigate. And there it was, sitting on the top step—a very small topiary owl. I picked it up and looked at it closely. It was amazing. There were ridges over its nose and around its eyes, and I realized after a moment that it was wearing a pair of glasses.

FROM: Charlie Curry ([email protected])

TO: Amy Curry ([email protected])

SUBJECT: hey

DATE: June 10

TIME: 4:45 p.m.

hey—

just wanted to say hi & make sure you’re okay. i wrote and asked mom & she said that she didn’t want to talk about it, but that you were “greatly disappointing her.”

it doesn’t sound like you, but well done!

anyway, hope you’re good.

charlie

FROM: Me ([email protected])

TO: Charlie Curry ([email protected])

SUBJECT: Re: hey

DATE: June 10

TIME: 11:45 p.m.

Hey—nice to hear from you.

I hope you’re doing well and that things are going okay with you.

I’m in Kentucky right now. (It’s a long story.) Let’s just say that Mom is furious with me, but the feeling is mutual. I’ll have to tell you all about it someday. I kind of wish you had phones there, actually. I think it’s an in-person story.

Talk to you soon, hopefully.

—Amy

She met a boy up in Kentucky.

—Steve Earle

“She’s home,” Lucien told us. He had arrived at the guesthouse shortly after I’d found the owl. Roger had emerged just as Lucien came in, and now poured himself a glass of water in silence.

“Just now?” I asked.

“Just now,” he said, crossing into the kitchen and taking a banana out of the fruit basket he’d brought with him that morning. “She’s probably going to bring the horse trailer around to the stables, get them settled in, and then go back to the main house.” By this point, I shouldn’t have been surprised that they had stables, but I was. “So here’s what I think,” he continued to Roger. “Why don’t Amy and I make ourselves scarce, and you can drive around to the house, and that way Had won’t have to know that you two stayed here last night?”

Roger just shrugged. “I don’t care if she knows,” he said a little sharply. “I’m not going to lie about it.”

“Okay,” I said, looking at him and trying to gauge what he was feeling. I’d woken up early, checked my e-mail, and done some research on Charlie’s facility. I hadn’t opened Julia’s e-mail, but I had looked at the subject line for a long moment before shutting the guesthouse laptop down. Roger had been holed up in his room that morning, and I hadn’t gotten a chance to talk to him about the night before. He seemed to be preoccupied—which was understandable, considering that he was about to see Hadley. “But it’s probably best that I’m not in the car with you, right?”

Roger looked at me for a moment, then nodded. “Right.” Maybe picking up on Roger’s tense vibe, Lucien left to load the bags into the car. When the door slammed shut behind him, I turned to Roger, trying to figure out what was going on with him.

“You feeling okay about this?” I asked.

“Fine,” he said, a little shortly. He glanced outside, then asked without looking at me, “Where did that owl come from?”

“Oh,” I said, smiling at it. “Lucien made it. Isn’t it cute?”

“Yeah,” he said hollowly. “Cute.”

“Are you okay?” I asked. I hadn’t ever seen him this withdrawn and couldn’t put my finger on what exactly was wrong.

“Fine,” he said again. “I’m fine.” He took a breath and looked at me. “Are you—,” he started, as Lucien came back in.

“Bags in the car,” he said. “All set?”

“Yep,” said Roger, causing me to smile. I took a last look back at the guesthouse, and we headed out to the cars. I placed the owl carefully in the backseat, and Roger glanced back at it, shook his head, and got in the driver’s side.

“Okay,” I said. “So I guess just call when you’re …” I wasn’t sure how to end this sentence. “When you want me to come meet you,” I finished. I pressed my lips together and looked at Roger in the car, my spot beside him empty. I was trying not to think about it, but I knew that our trip as we’d been taking it might well be over in a few minutes. Hadley had been his objective this whole time. And now that he’d reached it, what did that mean? If he and Hadley got back together—a thought that made my stomach clench a little bit—I had a feeling he wouldn’t be continuing this trip with me.