Dad puts the bag down, unties it, and pulls out the puffy jacket. “Thought this might be a good fit for her.” The girl looks at the jacket before reaching out to take it. “And a math book,” Dad says, pulling out the crinkly textbook.

The woman takes it and looks through the pages. “Thank you.”

“Here’s the real prize, though.” Dad reveals the turntable. “I fixed it. Should work all right with the electricity you have. It’s a present for you.” And the woman leans forward and gives him a kiss on his lips, so sudden it surprises me as much as if she’d hit him. I look down at the steps, understanding everything perfectly.

“You hungry, Josh?” the woman asks, carrying the turntable inside. “I’m making bluefish stew. We caught three of them this morning.”

I step into her house, which is much nicer than ours. There’s no dripping wetsuits over chair backs, no mildew stench or leaking windows, and the tabletops aren’t covered with tools and empty conch shells. Seeing it makes me realize how messily Dad and I have been living. My room’s full of fishing nets and drying socks. I don’t think Mom would’ve let us live like that, and maybe that’s the point, Dad trying to forget what it was like to live with her.

“Why don’t you show Josh your room?” the woman says, and I follow Fiona, because doing that sounds way better than staying here with Dad and this woman who knows him well enough to kiss him.

Fiona’s room has a plastic drawing table with a ceramic tea set on it, a couple of dolls, and a soccer ball. There’s nothing I’m interested in, until she shows me a deck of playing cards on her shelf. “Want to play war? I’m missing the ace and a three.”

“That’s okay,” I say. “I don’t think it matters.”

She moves the tea set off the plastic table and we sit in the small yellow chairs by the big window of her room overlooking the ocean. Along the small stretch of backyard are boxes with plastic bubbles over them. “What are those?” I ask.

“Mom grows potatoes and kale in them. You don’t have a mom?” she asks, pushing her small pile of cards together with both hands.

“Yeah, I have a mom.”

“Where is she?”

I look at the ocean. “Somewhere out there.”

“My dad was out there, too, but I don’t remember him; he drowned. Mom said you can’t be sad forever or you’ll drown from crying. You think your mom drowned?”

“No,” I say, and lay down a jack to her queen.

Fiona takes her win. “We moved here because Mom said it would be good for catching the wind, but I liked our old house better. It’s underwater now. Did you also steal someone’s house?”