His grandfather had lived a full life. He’d gone to war. He’d been married, more than once. And he’d spent the past decades prospecting in the Sierras. Now, at the end of his time, he stood as the last of his breed—stubborn, pure, and unbowed by the system. It was true, he’d missed out on some things along the way—his daughter’s various graduations and weddings and such—but for all that she had long ago forgiven him. He deserved respect for the wisdom he had acquired, living out there in the mountains with his mule. It wasn’t every day you met a free, wild man anymore, she said. It was just too bad he was so sadly lacking in health care.

“Oh, Jesus . . . Joseph,” the old man eventually squeezed out, “I need some water.”

Joseph filled a glass from the pitcher on the bed stand and resumed picking the cattails from his socks. The old man drank in loud gulps, his mouth a red circle inside the gray mass of his beard, his teeth gnarls of yellow stone. He reached a finger into the pill cup and pressed it to his wet lips. His chin shook.

The process took a long time. The old man had a lot of pills to take. Joseph blew on the window and carved a star in his condensed breath. He watched it disappear. He felt sorry for his mother. He felt sorry for his grandfather, too. He blew on the window again and the star reappeared, along with an old spiral, his initials, a face.

The hollow sound of glass on wood rang out, and Joseph’s grandfather smacked his lips and wiped his long fingers on the quilt. The overcast light hung in the air, gluing everything in place—the succulents near the window, the limp batik drapes, the small city of pill boxes on the end table. Outside, the world was racing forward; inside, the time was crawling, entombed.

“Where was I?” the old man said.

Joseph shrugged.

“Oh yeah,” the old man said. “The wind. The wind was restless, Joseph. It needed someplace to go. The wind was lonely before the world began. Do you understand what I’m saying here? The wind, it wanted a place to wander in.”

“The wind was all alone,” Joseph said, working a bur from the seam of his pants.

“Yes,” the old man said. “The wind was lucky though. Water came. It was the wind’s wanting that made the water come. It was the wind’s wanting that made the world begin. That’s how it all began, Joseph. The wind, then the water. When the water came, the wind had someplace to go. One wall and the world was made. Wind and water. One above and one below. And you know what happened then, Joseph? You know what happened when the water was there?”