“But what does that mean? I stand outside his door. I knock. I say ‘Josh.’ I say it twice. I tell him there is dinner. I tell him there is television. He says ‘cool.’ That’s all. Everything is ‘cool.’ And he stops going to class.”

There was a high scream from somewhere in Diane’s house, and the sound of a mirror cracking. The refrigerator opened, and a carton of almond milk hit the floor as if it had been slapped off its shelf. (It had.) The faceless old woman who secretly lives in her home was on one of her rampages again.

“Dammit.” Diane rolled her eyes and stood up.

“Relax, Diane. The milk is not a disaster. It does not need tending to right away.”

“Yes, finish your story.”

“Well, when he does come out of his room, he sits without speaking. His eyes retract. His hair grows long around his hands and feet, silky and straight and soft. His nostrils expand. What am I supposed to say to that? What is the right thing to do?”

She sighed, watching the almond milk spread across the floor.

“Honestly, there are times when I want to hit him,” she said. She had not known she was going to say it.

The coanchors glanced at each other and shuffled blank papers on their fake desk. The almond milk pooled against the cabinets. She needed to get a paper towel to wipe it up but didn’t feel like she could move.

“I mean I would never do that. I just think it. Does this make me a bad person?”

“You are only a bad person if you do bad things,” said the second anchor.

“Thank you.”

“That’s not an acquittal, Diane. The counterpoint is that you are only a good person if you do good things.”

“Turn off the television and look at this knife I found on eBay,” whispered the voice of the faceless old woman over Diane’s shoulder. She turned and looked down the hall, more out of habit than out of interest. It was empty and unnaturally dark. She felt a finger brush her cheek.

The faceless old woman does not like it when people watch television. Diane didn’t see her, had never seen her, but she looked down and there was a long hunting knife on the table. It was dull from use, but clean and otherwise in excellent shape.

“It’s a nice knife, Faceless Old Woman. Did you get a good deal on it?”

No reply.

She turned off the television. The anchors remained on-screen, talking about tornado safety in the desert, and her mind raced with the possibilities of how to better express her love to Josh.