“You got anyone for yourself?”

“Naw, not me.” She grimaces.

Then Simon hears the stairs squeak, a shift of feet on the aging wood, the risers gapped back from the tread like poorly set teeth. Simon shoots her a look with raised eyebrows and then urges them down toward the surface of the table. The stairs continue to let out their warnings and Simon, who still knows the whispers of this house, can hear whoever is walking down them swing out on the newel post, take three steps to the kitchen door and stop. Betty looks up from the table.

“Lincoln, get in here. Why you hangin your head like you was slow?”

Simon shifts in his chair and sees a boy enter the rare fluorescent kitchen light. Unsure, doe-eyed.

“Come on. Say hello to your uncle.”

The boy moves his eyes from Simon to Betty and back. He is careful of a joke at his expense, the potential for embarrassment. Even at ten he charts each room, mapping the dangers nestled within people.

Lincoln has known only this quiet house, empty of the traffic of people. He was six when his sister Irma flew in the door with the white man she announced to Betty she was going to marry. The man stood to the side of the door and looked at his feet, pinned against the wall by Betty’s withering gaze. “Well, good for you,” drawled Betty. “I just came back to get my clothes,” said Irma defiantly. Betty laughed. “From the looks of things it doesn’t seem like you’ve been wearin them too much. Go on then.” The man said nothing in his defense. Perhaps it was only then he realized Irma was using him to escape her mother’s gravity, that she clung to him only to break her orbit around that sad house and its history. Lincoln sat on Irma’s bed while she hurriedly stuffed her battered suitcase full. “We gonna move away from this cold-ass town,” she said. “San Diego. You know where that is?” Lincoln shook his head. “Well it’s a hell of a lot warmer than here, that’s for sure. Later on you can come live with us.” Lincoln said nothing. “Later on” held no meaning for him. With her suitcase in one hand she stomped down the stairs without looking at Betty. Lincoln followed her to the door, and she ruffled his hair. Irma stepped out and the man fell in behind her, swinging the door shut meekly, in pathetic deference to Betty. His blue Electra spat to life, coughed once as it idled down at the intersection, and was gone. After that Lincoln was left in a home packed to the rafters with stories Betty would never tell and trouble she’d never share. The house was full but silent.