AT MY OPEN front door is a white guy walking the line between middle age and old age and I cannot tell if I can trust him.

WE WERE IN the kind of love people only are when they just don’t know any better.

WE WAKE UP early, you and I, and go to the hospital. Anxious, empty stomachs.

SEVEN YEARS AGO, during that week in every September when summer turns to autumn, my husband and I rented a car to drive the long distance from Oregon to Massachusetts.