Emma Signed Over Her Kitchen Island to Keep Toby Safe in Massachusetts

apples, and the simple ingredients for soup.

The kitchen was empty now, the shadows lengthening across the pine floor. I knelt by the small table, spreading the wax in slow, circular motions.

This table had cost forty dollars at a yard sale in Quincy, its surface marked by old cup rings and the deep gouges of some forgotten craftsman’s knife. It was continue reading …