“I’ll be there to pick you up. You need anything? You sure you’re not in trouble?” She thinks of Georgia at fifteen, the DUI, the stolen truck. Thinking it was a good idea to let her spend the night in jail. The next morning, the look on her daughter’s face: the betrayal, the rage, the fear. Deborah knew she had made a terrible mistake. But she was a single mother trying to raise a daughter the only way she knew how. Never as straightforward as planting seeds, coaxing fruit from the garden. There was a whole alchemy of love and discipline that she must not have gotten right.

“I’m okay. I’ll be okay. I just need to get out of town.”

“Are you still with Josh? He hit you again?”

“No, not Josh. I’ve just got a bad feeling.” She wonders if her daughter isn’t alone. If she’s afraid to say what she is afraid of.

“Will you be safe, until you can get on a bus?”

A pause. “I’ll see you tomorrow, seven o’clock.” Deborah doesn’t know a lot of things about her daughter’s life. But she can tell when she’s scared. The small voice in the hallway. The sound of feet in footed pajamas padding down the stairs.

“I’ll pick you up. Tonight. Tell me where.”

“No, Ma, the bus is fine. That’s too long to drive.”

“At least tell me where to call you.”

“The Sunset Motel.”

“That’s where you’re staying tonight?”

“No, but you can leave a message for me there. Tell them it’s for Peaches.”

She doesn’t want to know what this means, that her daughter is going by another name. Georgia, Peaches. It would be a little funny, if it didn’t make her worry more. Despite herself, she can already hear the innuendo: Have a taste. Shake my tree. A shiver works its way up her spine.

DEBORAH DOESN’T sleep that night. Around 3 a.m., she heaves herself out of bed, goes to the kitchen for tea, tries to read. Her jam is lined up on the counter, the mess of the afternoon long since tidied away. When the first light comes into the kitchen, it makes the jars glow, a pinky red. The sight used to be comforting, but today it is unsettling. Maybe it’s her sleepless brain, but she can only look at the jam and see blood. She thinks of her daughter coming home four, four and a half years ago after a night out with Josh, her lip split.

She keeps looking at herself in the rearview on the drive to Scranton. The lipstick perks up her face, but not enough to make up for the circles under her eyes. She’s early. She watches the clock on the dash. 6:03. 6:27. 6:44. 6:58. 7:05.