I left X-ville without a single family photo, so all I have are my shifting memories to go on.

They don’t tell you about these things. They don’t prepare you for problems like that.”

I don’t remember ever meeting Mr. Polk but if I did, he made no impression on me. I guess that is how those sick people get by. They look like nobodies, but behind closed doors they turn into monsters.

The dead body was so strange, so unsettling, I had to believe he got what he deserved. To believe otherwise would have been too much. Back then I believed whatever I could to avoid the terrifying reality of things.

“I don’t know how I got into this. But now that we’re in it, we have to finish what we started.”

“Please, I really need you, Eileen. Be a friend,” I began to cave. She pulled a cigarette out for me, lit it with trembling hands. “You’re the only one I trust,” she said. That was all it took to reel me back in. She

When I think back on my childhood, not much appears but the house itself, the furniture and its arrangements, the change of seasons in the backyard. There are no faces on people, only their shadows slipping out of sight as they leave the room.

I walked carefully, not wanting to slip and fall and break the wine or look foolish. I was nervous. It had been a long time since I’d gone any place I wanted to be.

The worst crime I could commit in his eyes was to do anything for my own pleasure, anything outside of my daughterly duties. Evidence of a will of my own was seen as the ultimate betrayal.