She had mentioned this possibility before, but it had never seemed real. Pictures began to swirl in Nate’s head like a sad old slide show—all the familiar spots he’d never thought about much, because he figured they’d be there forever. There was the root cellar where, on long winter days, he and his sister used to make monsters out of old sprouted potatoes; the creek where they sailed their homemade paper boats when the spring rains came; the hayloft in the barn where he and Junie had their Tarzan swing set up; the clubhouse he and Larry had built and the pond where he and Larry had fished. And, of course, there was the land itself—four hundred acres. He’d driven over every square foot of them in the old John Deere.

“Maybe Poppa can help,” Nate said, but his mother was already shaking her head.

“Your grandfather’s already helped as much as he possibly can. And if the police keep acting like I’m a murderer, he might have to hire an expensive big-city lawyer for me too.”

Mom kicked her shoes off and leaned wearily against a kitchen chair. “It’s that rifle. They keep coming back to how they can’t find the rifle and how that must mean I shot your dad and threw it away someplace.”

“They can’t send you to jail.”

“I wish I could say for sure you were right, honey.”

It took Nate by surprise when she came over and put her arms around him—how thin she had become. “I wanted so badly to keep things normal for you and your sister,” she whispered.

“I don’t even know what normal is,” he said.

Saturday morning Junie stayed in her pajamas and watched Cartoon Cavalcade while their mother sat at the kitchen table with their grandfather, going over the books again and doing a tool and equipment inventory. Nate had offered to help, but he was relieved when his mother told him, “Never mind, Poppa and I can handle this.”

He pushed thoughts about moving out of his head and watched the clock instead. The baseball tryouts were due to start at noon. He put on his cleats, grabbed his glove, and thought about last summer, before the hailstorm, when hopes were high. From the drawer where he kept his baseball cards, he took out his favorite—Sandy Koufax—and stuck it in his pants pocket.

Yesterday he’d decided to ask his mom to drive him over to the playing field for tryouts, but seeing the tight, worried expression on her face, it seemed impossible.

Nate figured he’d warm up a little first out by the barn. Maybe he’d call up Jed Landry and see if he was driving to town anytime soon.