“Well, it’s hard to lose anyone you love, but I’ve been losing her day by day for five years. The cruelty of it is hard to fathom, to see someone so very strong and independent lose any sense of who they are. And unfortunately, my father is well on the same road, too. I expect he only has a few more months. He’s living with me now. I really should be there with him, but after Mom passed, I couldn’t go home. I asked a colleague of mine, Monica, to stay at my place, so at least I know Dad’s okay. But I feel guilty. I didn’t even call him to say that Mom—his wife—was gone. He wouldn’t have understood, and I couldn’t handle that. Thirty-five years together, and they didn’t know each other anymore. They were strangers. It’s such a lonely disease.”

“I’m so sorry, Tom.”

He smiled at me again. Then he reached out and took my hand. I liked it.

“You know what’s utterly terrifying?” he went on, turning back to the fire. “I know my time will come. It will happen to me, too. Sooner or later, I’ll be the man who forgets his past, his friends, his entire identity.”

“You don’t know that for sure.”

“Let’s just say my family history makes it a pretty safe bet. Genetics spares no one. But it’s not all bad, not really. A cloud over my head like that reminds me to live a life that matters. If I lose my own memory, at least I want to believe that others will have good memories of me.”

It made me inexpressibly sad to hear him talk like that.

“Are you married, Tom?” I asked.

“No. Between my job and my parents, I haven’t had time for anyone else in my life.”

“You’re very young to be the sheriff.”

“I know.” He laughed at himself. “Don’t think I’m so special. Truly, no one else in Mittel County wanted the job, and I admit, I did. It’s what I’ve always wanted to do. It was my dream ever since I was a boy watching The Lone Ranger on television. Some people go through life never knowing what they want, but me, I always did. My dad was still relatively lucid two years ago. He insisted I go after it when the old sheriff died. I thought I should wait until I was older. I also didn’t think I could juggle being the sheriff with caring for the two of them, but he told me, you can’t ignore opportunity when it comes knocking or it just moves on to somebody else.”

“I think I’d like your father,” I said.

“You’d like who he was, that’s for sure. Everything I am is because of him.”

“Well, I like you, too.”