But I found myself in a third place altogether when Larkin’s mother suddenly appeared through the trees.

Chapter Forty-Four

She was a small woman, which should have made me feel better, but she was like the centipedes that sometimes raced in a frenzy across the cabin floor, their legs like brittle hair, so fast and shivery that I’d leap in terror at the sight of them.

“Stay away from my boy,” she said.

And I yelled, “Mother!” as loud as I could. And then again, “Mother!” more loudly still.

Maisie appeared at the door of the woodshed, growling.

Samuel came out into the yard.

He took one look at the woman and seemed to be split, as I had, between wanting to stay and wanting to go.

I loved him more than ever when he scampered to my side and took hold of my hand.

“Who’s that?” Samuel said.

“That’s Larkin’s mother.”

He peered at her. “I don’t like Larkin’s mother.”

“Where’s your own mother at?” she said.

“Mother!” I called again, more loudly.

And she came through the cabin door all at once.

Esther, who followed behind her, took one look at the situation and stopped short, wavering in place, like a dress pinned to a line.

My mother didn’t slow for one moment.

“And what’s this about?” she said firmly, taking her place at my side.

But just then Larkin came down the path, too, yelling, “Mother! Mother, wait!”

We all stayed in place, like game pieces on a board.

Larkin slowed as he came into the yard.

I tried to see him through my mother’s eyes, this lean boy with his dark, dark hair and his worn-out clothes, and his half-this-half-that face. From one side: just a boy. From the other: a boy hurt.

But we were looking at him straight on, and he was both of those things and more besides. “I’m sorry if she scared you,” he said. “Mother, what are you doing?”

“Who’s that boy?” Samuel said.

“That’s Larkin,” I said.

“I didn’t scare them,” his mother said, though she had.

But, up close, I could see that this was no centipede.

Looking at Larkin’s mother was like looking at a broken bowl. Jagged. A woman in pieces.

And I didn’t see how she could ever be whole again.

Or hold anything properly ever again.

Not with that look on her face.

As on the mountaintop, I could feel the mad-sorrow coming off her like a stink.

“I don’t know you,” my mother said. “I’m Evelyn.”

“You don’t need to know me. Or my boy either.”

My mother looked at Larkin’s battered face. “Did you do that to him?”

“Of course not. He did that himself, paying no attention to what he was doing. But she’s the one who cut him.”

My mother turned to me.