Sunshine called out to Seattleites in a language they understood, dragged them out of their hillside homes and encouraged them to put on expensive sneakers and enjoy the mountains and lakes and winding forest roads. After which they would stop by their local Thriftway Grocery Store for prepackaged steaks to put on their grills at weekend barbecues.

Life was soft here in Seattle. Safe and contained. Crosswalks and traffic lights and helmets and policemen on horses and bicycles.

As a mother, she appreciated all that protection, and she had tried to settle into this comfortable life. She never told anyone—not even Mama—how much she missed the howling of wolves or a day spent alone on the snow machine or the echoing crack of ice in the spring breakup. She bought her meat instead of hunting it; she turned on the faucet for water and flushed her toilet when she was finished. The salmon she grilled in the summer came already cleaned and filleted and washed, caught like strips of silver and pink silk behind cellophane canopies.

Today, all around her people were laughing, talking. Dogs were barking, jumping up to catch Frisbees. Teenage boys threw footballs back and forth.

“Look!” MJ said, pointing up at the pink Congratulations Graduate! balloon bobbing at the end of a yellow streamer. He had a half-eaten cupcake in one hand and wore a goatee of frosting.

Leni knew he was growing up fast (a first-grader now), so she had to snuggle and kiss him while he still allowed it. She scooped him into her arms. He gave her a sweaty, buttercream kiss and hugged her in that way of his, all in, arms thrown around her neck as if he would drown without her. The truth was that she would drown without him.

“Who else is ready for dessert?” Grandma Golliher said from her place by the picnic table. She had just finished setting out Leni’s favorite dessert: akutaq. Eskimo ice cream made of snow, Crisco, blueberries, and sugar. Mama had saved clumps of winter snow in the freezer, just for this.

MJ sprang free, hands raised triumphantly (both hands, just to be sure he was seen). “Me! I want akutaq!”

Grandma came around the picnic table and stood beside Leni. Grandma had changed a lot in the past few years, softened, although she still dressed for the country club even on a picnic.

“I’m so proud of you, Leni,” Grandma said.

“I’m proud of me, too.”

“My friend Sondra from the club. She says there’s an opening for a photographer’s assistant at Sunset magazine. Should I have her make a call on behalf of Susan Grant?”

“Yeah,” Leni said. “I mean, yes, please.” She could never quite adjust to the way things were done down here. Life seemed to reward who you knew more than what you could do.