“Stay awhile,” she said. “Get used to being home again. You can take my mind off everything. I need that, Telly.” Her hand was on his private parts. I could just tell. She was rubbing up and down. Telly grabbed the wheel. His knuckles went white. He made a weird sound and I knew something shiny and red was springing out of Telly. I saw it when Chicken rubbed at himself with his paw. Whenever Gloria caught him doing that she said, “If only that dog had sense to polish something useful.” She’d yell at Chicken. But she wasn’t yelling at Telly now.

“Well. It won’t hurt no one,” he said in a soft way. “No one got to know.” He turned off the truck and dropped the keys on the floor. He leaped out and Gloria scooted her legs under the steering wheel and went fast behind him. They ran into the house. The screen door crashed back.

I got out my door and went around to close Telly’s door. Then I went up and sat on the step. Behind a piece of wood on the porch, I saw curly yellow hair. I reached and pulled out Jenny the Head. I couldn’t remember putting her there. I held her on my lap and patted her. She was so soft. I remembered how dirty she was when me and Rowan found her floating in the ditch. How Rowan cleaned her for me.

Shar came running down the driveway. Her T-shirt was coming up and I could see her bright middle. Her shoe slapped the ground because part of it was broken.

“I’m back!” she said, and her arms hopped up. “I got back this morning.” She sat on the step next to me. Shar was like Rowan. She never checked for nails.

“Your hair is nice,” I said. Shar had it cut so it looked like the top of a mushroom. “Did you have fun?” I asked. I put Jenny the Head back behind the wood.

“With my mom?”

“Yeah.”

“Of course I did. She lets me do whatever I want. Not like Aunt Erma.”

“Oh.”

“But Aunt Erma said some man tricked Rowan and he ran away. And that the police were all over everywhere. And Darrell was searching too, and you guys were on the TV. Is that true?”

I nodded.

“My best friend’s famous.” She put her arm around my shoulder. “So, when’s he coming back?”

“I don’t know. Soon.”

“Yeah. Probably soon.”

There was creaking behind me. I looked but Gloria’s special chair wasn’t rocking back and forth by itself.

“Do you hear that?” Shar said, and she laughed.

“What?”

“Your mom.”