As she cooed ineffective words of solace into Molly’s ear, a silver Cadillac pulled up to the curb next to her, increasing Molly’s head-thrown-back screaming. Amy reached down and touched the top of Jack’s sleeping head in the stroller and pulled Molly closer. A woman in a navy blue suit— obviously well rested, with her coiffed hair and carefully applied makeup—popped from the car looking much too happy for Amy’s frame of mind. The woman reached into the backseat and pulled out a briefcase. She looked up, and Amy was embarrassed to be still standing, staring, her own hair not brushed since the day before, her mascara at least two days old and surely creased below eyes that had not closed for more than three hours at a time in the past week.

“Well, hello there.” The woman’s perky voice matched her skipping step.

“Hello,” Amy answered. This was her hometown; one must never be rude. You might actually be related to the person on some branch of the family tree. She laid the still-screaming Molly back in the double stroller.

The woman curled her mouth in a sympathetic smile. “Oh, I do remember those days. But honestly, you live through them. You really do.”

“That’s what I hear.”

“One morning you’ll wake up and realize you slept through the night . . . at least until they drive.”

“When is that? Next century?”

“It feels that way, I know. But Lordy, all mine are grown and gone. I babysit now for their kids. But don’t tell my clients”—she gestured toward the house and bent to whisper—“that I’m a grandma.”

“Well, you don’t look like a grandma, that’s for sure.”

“I’m a”—the woman laughed and stood straighter—“a real estate agent.”

A slow tingle began below Amy’s breast and she wasn’t sure if the sensation came from Molly’s time to nurse, or the words “real estate agent” right in front of her dream house.

Amy whispered, “Are you selling?” She gestured toward the house. “Are they selling this house?”

The woman formed another sympathetic smile. “Unfortunately, the sweet woman who lived here . . . well, she died.”

In her blurred fatigue, above Molly’s now dwindling screams, Amy found the words she wanted to say but normally would have swallowed. “This is my house.”

“What?”

“This is my favorite house . . . on the street, in town.” She swept her hand through the air.

“Well”—the woman seemed to hesitate now, her perkiness fading—“it is rather . . . expensive, you know, being on Magnolia, and it’s a Historic Preservation home, protected by the city, and—”

“I know. I know.”