I save Arn’s workbench for last. There’s too much pain hovering around his worn table, the notes tacked above in his slanted scrawl, his projects never to be finished. I walk to it slowly, feeling the waves of sadness wash over me as my eyes touch all the things that he never will.

My vision’s drawn to something smooth and shiny on a top shelf. My hand closes around the brown glass dropper. I lift the three-inch bottle up to the light. Brown liquid sloshes inside. Half a bottle of iodine. Jackpot.

I run back to the house. When I barrel into Ethan’s room, he’s a sweaty moaning mess. I slide up to his bed and push the hair out of his eyes.

“I got it, bud,” I say, unscrewing the bottle. “Hold still.”

He moans, but stops thrashing. I fill the little dropper with iodine and drip it into his wounds. Such a little fix for such a huge problem. I pray it’ll be enough.

Ethan calms a little, though his arm still throbs. I find myself rubbing his sweaty back and singing verses of “You Are My Sunshine” and “Rock-a-bye Baby,” songs my mother would sing on nights when we were fitful or the thunder rattled the walls. The words feel heavy in my mouth.

He falls into a feverish sleep. Exhausted, I stumble down the hall.

Night has crept up in all the commotion. I stare out the ragged hole that was our front window to the quiet of our yard. The cool twilight air that pulses in feels good on my face. Somewhere an owl gives a mournful hoot and the insects buzz in harmony. I run my hands over my arms and slump on the couch. The familiar smells and sounds help me to breathe.

I’ve spent most of the day alternating between beating myself up for letting Ethan check a trap alone and picturing Auntie and my mama in chains. Now in the dark, my thoughts fly to them. Are they crouched against a concrete wall in one of the jail cells, waiting for the Breeders to collect their prize? My mind supplies chains on their ankles or collars around their neck. The horror of that thought haunts me. I hug myself and shiver. I gotta free them. But how?

My eyes trace the scattered remains of our life strewn around the living room. There’s shards of a ceramic vase, the desert flowers my mother lovingly picked shriveled to husks on the floor. My eyes trace past shreds of our tattered wallpaper. A picture frame, knocked off a sideboard, lies broken on the ground. I pull myself off the couch and pick it up with tender hands.

The cherry wood frame, dented at the corners, holds the treasure I was seeking. The glass is gone, but the drawing remains. I lift the paper delicately out of the frame. It’s a piece of butcher block with a ten-year-old’s pencil scrawl. To anyone but my mama, it would’ve been trash, but she framed it and set it on the sideboard. Looking at it now brings a tightness to my throat I can’t swallow down.