“It’s okay, gwus. That’s good enough.” Mom shoveled, and she went at it, jabbing and jabbing the sharp metal tip into the sand, loosening all the hard ground, and then she scooped it up and tossed it into the woods. She didn’t stop until that hole was dug.

“She has to do it,” Frick said, talking about Paige.

Mom rubbed Paige’s back, but Paige didn’t say anything, just stared out at the river. Mom rubbed her back, whispered in her ear, hugged her, let go, hugged her again. Soon, Paige moved, looked down at the ground at the black plastic tub at her feet and she bent down and picked it up. She cradled it, brought it to the hole. She knelt. The fire spat yellow. She stayed like that for a long time, holding the tub, whispering to it. Then she spoke aloud. “I can’t do it, Mumma. I can’t do it.” I wanted to rub her back the way Mom did, but when I stepped closer Frick held his hand out to stop me. Mom went to her, told her she had to. Paige set the tub in the hole and looked at Frick. “You’re sure it’s the right thing to do?”

“It’s how I was taught,” he told her.

Paige got up and Frick said she could go back to the truck, and I tried to follow her down the dark path, but Mom told me no. “We dug the hole,” she said, “and now we fill it.” She looked at Frick to make sure.

We were all on the ground and in the cold sand, using our hands to shovel the sand back into the hole and over the tub and when the sand fell it hit the tub, made thumping noises, and eventually the tub was gone, buried four feet under the sand, and I wondered if the river would undo our work when it rose up, ripping away the sand and sucking out my tub, taking it away forever and ever, carrying it downriver before dumping it out into the salty ocean.

GET ME SOME MEDICINE

A November rain battered the window above the kitchen sink, and a damp brown leaf pressed against the glass. Fellis was searching for the deck of cards. I sat at the table, and I slid away the ashtray with Fellis’s cigarette smoke coiling into my nose.

Fellis slammed a cupboard shut and brought the cards to the table. “Shuffle these, Dee,” he said to me. “I have to take a shit.” He went down the hallway and into the bathroom. I shuffled the cards for a long while.

The past two weeks we did nothing but sit and binge-watch TV, and I was getting tired of it. I wanted movement. My neck was achy and stiff, and while I did enjoy having to constantly focus on the television, following along and paying attention, I felt that I was slowly forgetting something I needed to remember. Maybe I didn’t need to remember—maybe I wanted to remember.