It would be better to keep it that way. If we could. If we got Robert back. If, if, if. I was so tired of that word.

We made excellent time, getting so ahead of schedule that as we pulled off the interstate, I worried we’d arrive too early. I wanted to do everything exactly right. There was a cluster of stores and gas stations at this exit: Krystal, Chick-fil-A, Dollar General. I asked Trey to pull in at a gas station to use the bathroom and get coffee, but mostly to kill time.

Trey didn’t need the restroom. He stayed by the pumps, topping off my car. Marshall and I headed in. There was a young woman outside by the door. She leaned against the ice machine smoking, though she looked way too young to buy cigarettes legally. She had lank brown hair and a rash of pimples on her forehead that her straggly bangs failed to hide. She straightened as we drew close.

“Hey, ma’am?” she said, to me, only me, and her eyes twitched nervously toward Marshall. I understood why. He looked like a cop. And yet she was desperate enough to talk to me, and so I stopped. “Could you maybe get me something to eat?”

“Sure,” I said. She smiled, and I saw a large black cavity, oval shaped, growing between her two front teeth. “What would you like?”

Marshall cleared his throat, a neutral sound. I ignored it.

She licked her chapped lips. “If you gave me a little money, I could pick. They’ll let me come inside if I can show them I have money.”

“We’ll get you a sandwich,” Marshall said, and instantly her eyes dropped and she stepped back. He took my arm, and I let him tote me inside. When the swinging glass door had swished closed behind us, he told me, “If you give her money, she’ll just buy drugs.”

“Oh, you think?” I said, tart. I took my arm back and went to the bathroom.

When I got out, Marshall was already paying for our coffee by the register. I went to the refrigerated case, looking for soft things, because of her teeth. I didn’t see anything I’d want to feed my girls. Not for a meal. In the end I picked out two different kinds of Lunchables, a carton of milk, and a bottle of orange juice. I headed for the register, passing through the snack aisle to add a plain Hershey’s chocolate bar and a four-pack of Dole fruit cups, so old they had a fine layer of dust on the cardboard shell. The date stamp said they were still good, though.