We don’t sleep. It was what Mama always said. You and me. The connection between them a constant, a comfort, as if similarity reinforced the love between them. Certainly it was true that Mama had had trouble sleeping since Dad had come home. Whenever Leni woke in the middle of the night, she invariably found her mother drifting through the house, her diaphanous robe trailing open. In the dark, Mama tended to talk to herself in a whisper, saying words Leni could never quite make out.

“Are we really going?” Leni asked.

Mama stared at the black coffee percolating in the little glass cap at the top of the metal pot. “I guess so.”

“When?”

“You know your dad. Soon.”

“Will I get to finish the school year?”

Mama shrugged.

“Where is he?”

“He went out before dawn to sell the coin collection he inherited from his dad.” Mama poured herself a cup of coffee and took a sip, then set the mug down on the Formica counter. “Alaska. Christ. Why not Siberia?” She took a long drag on her cigarette. Exhaled. “I need a girlfriend to talk to.”

“I’m your friend.”

“You’re thirteen. I’m thirty. I’m supposed to be a mother to you. I need to remember that.”

Leni heard the despair in her mother’s voice and it frightened her. She knew how fragile it all was: her family, her parents. One thing every child of a POW knew was how easily people could be broken. Leni still wore the shiny silver POW bracelet in memory of a captain who hadn’t come home to his family.

“He needs a chance. A new start. We all do. Maybe Alaska is the answer.”

“Like Oregon was the answer, and Snohomish, and the seed packets that would make us rich. And don’t forget the year he thought he could make a fortune in pinball machines. Can we at least wait until the end of the school year?”

Mama sighed. “I don’t think so. Now go get dressed for school.”

“There’s no school today.”

Mama was silent for a long time, then said quietly, “You remember the blue dress Dad bought you for your birthday?”

“Yeah.”

“Put it on.”

“Why?”

“Shoo. Get dressed now. You and I have things to do today.”

Although she was irritated and confused, Leni did as she was told. She always did as she was told. It made life easier. She went into her room and burrowed through her closet until she found the dress.

You’ll look pretty as a picture in this, Red.