I glanced at the picture, a nothing image, a stock photo of palm trees, flat-fronted buildings, and a green lawn, then I turned it over to see the careful handwriting, printed like a child. Her handwriting. Mama.

She had written. She had found a moment away from him to write.

There was a return address on the postcard. Arcata, California.

I read the postcard. I pocketed it and got back in the truck.

Grayson was staring at the fire. He looked hopeful when I opened the farmhouse door. I thought again: What had I done, what had I done, letting a stranger come here?

I didn’t waste time. “There’s been a change of plans,” I said. “I’m sorry, but you have to go.”

He stumbled to get up, his boot clumping on the floor. “What’s going on?”

“I have to go somewhere, and you can’t stay here alone.”

“Well, when are you coming back?”

“It’s not like that.” I shifted in the doorway, my shadow casting a long finger into the room, a column of darkness falling over him. “I have to be gone for a while. I have to shut up the farm. I’m taking my house.”

I had not, until that moment, decided to take the tiny house. But it would save on hotels. It would be safer at night than sleeping in the truck, I realized, and I wouldn’t have to worry about squatters while I was gone. My mama and I wouldn’t even have to come back to the farm, if we didn’t want to, if he wouldn’t let us. I had certainly paid for the tiny house in my labor. I could pay for it again, if I had to, in cash, with the money from the last harvest. The harvest I had done myself.

“How’s that going to work?” Grayson said.

My hand was starting to feel heavy on the doorknob. “Look, I’m sorry but you have to go back home. Something’s come up and I have to leave.”

“What’s going on?” He wasn’t giving up. He had nothing waiting for him. A cold house in an empty neighborhood. A job with no shifts. No car. He couldn’t walk very far with that cast. “Where are you going?” Grayson said.

“To go get my mama,” I said.

“Can I come?”