I think back to my own experience with hogs as a kid. We didn’t raise them, but over the years we kept a few for butchering. My datt would buy the occasional piglet at the auction in Millersburg—cute little pink babies my ten-year-old self fell in love with on sight. But those pink babies grew quickly into four-hundred-pound animals, not all of which had amicable personalities. The boars in particular, which commonly weighed in at five hundred pounds or more, became aggressive. When I was eight years old, I remember one of our big sows finding a chicken in her pen. She chased the hen down, cornered it, and proceeded to eat it alive while I screamed for her to stop. In the context of Leroy Nolt’s death, the memory makes me shudder.

It’s been a busy, eventful day, and so far I’ve been relatively successful in keeping my personal problems at bay. Tomasetti has called twice; both times I let his call go to voice mail. I know it’s stupid. I’ve been living with him for seven months now. I love him. I trust him. He’s my best friend and confidante. Despite all of those things, I don’t know how to tell him about my pregnancy. I want to believe it will be a happy moment for both of us, but I honestly have no idea how he’ll react.

Setting the list aside, my appetite for the sandwich waning, I pick up my phone and dial his cell. I nearly hang up after two rings; in some small corner of my mind I’d hoped it would go to voice mail. Then I hear his voice, and in that instant I’m certain everything’s going to be all right. Good or bad or somewhere in between, we’ll deal with this.

“I was starting to think you were avoiding me,” he says, but there’s a smile in his voice.

Usually we share an easy camaraderie that includes a good bit of verbal jousting. But for an instant I can’t conjure a comeback, and I feel a slow rise of what feels like panic because I don’t know what to say. Finally, I land on the truth, hoping it comes out right. “I was.”

“If it’s about my eating that last Hershey’s Kiss…”

“So you’re the culprit.”

“Busted.” But his words are halfhearted. He’s an astute man; he knows something’s up.

We fall silent. I can practically feel his concern, gentle fingers coming through the line, pressing against me to make sure I’m all right.

“What is it?” he asks.

“I need to talk to you. I mean, in person. Tonight.”

“Is everything all right?”

“Yes,” I say automatically, then think better of it and add, “I’m not sure … exactly.”

“Okay.” A thoughtful silence ensues. “You want to talk now?”

“Not over the phone.”