German-Irish-Scandinavian stock. “I’m sorry. I don’t want to fight with you, and I don’t want to be disrespectful. But I’m trying so hard and I don’t feel like you even care—”

“Of course I care! I’m worried sick about you all. I lie awake at night, unable to sleep with all the worrying.”

“I don’t want you to worry. Worrying won’t change anything. The only thing that will get us through is getting through, and we’re doing it, Mama, one day at a time. It might not be pretty, but it works, and I’m lucky. My kids are good kids. Yes, they’re having some problems adjusting to all the changes, but they’re twelve, fourteen, and fifteen, and boys. Life’s not easy for them right now.”

“You aren’t the only one to raise boys. I raised three, too…” Her voice cracks, and she falls silent. We’re both suddenly, achingly aware that although she raised three, we just buried Cody, the brother closest to me in age and my best friend growing up.

The loss is still too new, the grief too raw. It was hard enough losing my brother. I can’t even fathom losing a son.

My mother has paled, but she finds her voice. “Boys need discipline. They need a firm hand.”

“And I’m trying.” I feel a surge of fury. Fury at John for falling in love with someone else. Fury at the economy that went south just when I had to become financially self-sufficient. And most of all, fury at me for coming home. I don’t know why I thought coming back to Parkfield would be a good idea. I don’t know how I thought moving back to Texas after Cody’s death would help anything. It hasn’t. I’m the first to admit that I shouldn’t have left New York. Don’t know what I was thinking. Don’t know that I am thinking. But I don’t need Mama rubbing it in my face. “I have a different relationship with my boys than you had with yours.”

Mama’s chin lifts, hands clasped prayerfully together. “You don’t think Bo was disrespectful last night? Shouting at you? Cursing at his brother? Slamming doors?”

“I think he’s fourteen and he melted down. He lost it.