But now it was Olive Riley came to take out on adventures. Olive figured that maybe Riley was lonely, too, missing Mama and looking for company. She took Olive out for milkshakes, went for walks in the woods with her, invited Olive to come stay at her place on the weekends, where they’d watch old black-and-white horror movies and eat piles of candy. Riley always got a big bag of Swedish Fish for Olive because they were her favorite. They never talked about Mama. That felt like the point; that Riley was trying to take Olive’s mind (and her own, too, maybe) off Mama, to help her forget that her own mother had just up and left her and Daddy. But no amount of horror movies, popcorn, and Swedish Fish could make Olive forget.

Daddy, he pretended not to hear the rumors about Mama, either. He went to his job (he worked maintenance for the town, fixing roads and culverts and driving a snowplow in the winter) and came home each evening. He stopped playing cards with friends or going out for a beer in the evening. He stayed home and cooked microwave dinners for him and Olive. They were too bland and greasy—Salisbury steak, fried chicken, and mashed potatoes that didn’t taste anything like actual potatoes—but Olive smiled and swallowed them down. The only time he actually cooked real food was when Riley came, and then it was always spaghetti with spicy Italian sausages. He even splurged and bought garlic bread and a bag of premade salad. They pretended, Daddy and Olive, that this was how they ate every night, so that Riley wouldn’t worry about them.

“Your mama will be back,” he promised Olive when they were alone one night, eating their crappy microwaved Salisbury steak dinners with fake mashed potatoes and little square apple pies. “And you know what I think?” Suddenly his eyes were bright again for the first time in what seemed like forever. He looked around the kitchen, as if he had never seen it before—the dingy walls with patches of missing wallpaper, the peeling Formica on the counter. “I think we should surprise her. Fix the house up real nice for her, what do you say?”

Of course Olive said yes. And this was how the renovations started.

. . .

The spare bedroom wall got knocked down first, her father letting Olive take the first swing with the sledgehammer. She stood looking at the wall through fogged safety glasses. “Are you sure?” she asked, testing the weight of the heavy hammer.

“Hell yes, I’m sure,” Daddy said. “Knock it down, baby. Knock it all down.”

She gave a few tentative swings, hating the destruction. Then Daddy took over, smashing away with a frenzy that frightened her. They were tearing down the wall to make a larger bedroom for her parents.