She opened the slip of paper and stared at the phone number. She’d memorized it by now, but she still gazed at the numbers scribbled in his handwriting. She reached for the phone, placing her hand on the receiver and tapping her finger on the curved handset.

The weather the past two weeks had been incredibly cold, the sky filled with ice-cube clouds frozen over a town shaded beneath its gray shadow. The unusual cold without snow had left the town and all her friends in a quiet mood; most people were hiding in their homes. Even when she ventured out, the streets appeared like part of an empty movie set: cars parked at the curb, empty planters on front porches, vacant Adirondack chairs on lawns, rusted bikes tipped against garages. She remembered the days when this weather would have kept her inside the house with the kids, playing Candyland a thousand times, watching videos and making chocolate-chip cookies.

Now she slid into the gray days wondering what lay on the other side. She was amazed as the kids moved in and out of the house, as Phil drove to work and came home and she cooked and smiled and even—on a few occasions—made love before drifting off into a sleep that was never really sleep, but clouded images that carried her in and out of consciousness.

The phone rang, shook beneath her finger. She flung her hand in the air as if the phone were white-hot, burning—as if it knew what she had been about to dial on its numbered face.

She rubbed her temples and let it ring three times before picking up. The background static of a car phone came before the voice and her heart rolled in the hope that it might be him, calling her at home. Maybe there was good news about the Trust or maybe he just wanted to talk.

“Hello, my dearest hibernating friend. I’m on my way over and I didn’t want to embarrass you and catch you in bed, or worse—up, but in your pajamas.”

“Carol Anne, aren’t you the thoughtful one? I am not in my pajamas and I’ve been up since five a.m.”

“Well, I’m in your driveway, so let me in.”

She looked out the window and there was Carol Anne pulling into the driveway, waving out the driver’s-side window.

Amy hung up the phone without saying goodbye and walked to the front door; each step she took required an immense amount of concentration and the thumps on the hardwood floor sounded like tired, tired, tired.