“What?” I said.
“Nothing.”
“Dad.”
He looked at me.
“Do exactly what Claire tells you,” he said. “Don’t worry about me.”
“Why would I worry about you?”
But he didn’t answer. He just went out to his truck and came back with a broom, a dustpan, and a cardboard box. He set them by the door.
Ezoic
“For when Claire says you can clean up,” he said.
That was all he said.
He stayed until the sun went down. He helped me find the water meter in the basement and photograph it. He checked the bathroom floors for soft spots. He walked through every room with a flashlight, looking at the ceilings for water stains.
He didn’t say another word about Brian.
I slept at Dad’s house that night. I couldn’t stay in that house with the holes in the walls and the broken mirror on the floor. It felt like sleeping next to something that had died.
