“Maybe. Do you want to stay here?”

She stared at him in the dark, her face grave. “No.”

“I’ll be fine.”

“I’m going with you.”

They got out. Snow covered the north field and made mounds over the dead scrub. They broke their own trail through the new tufts of snow, booting a path a foot deep. The distance perhaps a mile. Approaching the barn from the side. The night sky black and hunching. Flecks of lonely starlight shining down. The weathered wood a pale shape. In the hushed cold, they squatted and watched. No light anywhere. No tracks in the drive.

In a tree, an owl stared down at them. A white coat of feathers. Its yellow eyes shining.

No one.

No one is here.

Jack got the hammer from the pack and went around to the back of the barn. Crunch of snow beneath feet. The latch on the rear window was weak. Gray wood. When pulled, the shutter scraped open. They stood listening.

Nothing.

The wind in the naked stand of trees.

“Stay close to me,” he whispered. “Okay?”

“We could still leave.”

“It’s going to be okay. Come on.”

He pushed her up and through the window, then hoisted himself over and dropped beside her onto the dirt floor. Cold and wood. Exposed joists. To the left was a large hook, hanging by rope from a metal pulley. Shape of a shovel. The corners dark. All of it was veiled in gloom, too hard to see. Jack shoved the hammer into his belt and opened the backpack and took out a candle and some matches. Pain was stitching in his side.

They stood breathing.

White plumes of air. Smell of decay.

Jack struck the match. The rack of elk horns above the door bent in shadowy beams and curved to black antler points. On the plank wall, he could see part of a picture in an old frame. Summertime. Mom was standing in front of a lake, holding Matty, smiling. Matty was just a baby. Jack a boy at her side, clutching her hand. We went fishing that day. Jack scorned the sudden leaping in his chest and swung the candle out into the darkness. In the corner was the Coke machine. The floral couch. Bookcase.

He listened.

Nothing. A distant scratching of branches.

Wind.

They crossed the barn, their shadows reaching over the dirt. Jack would have time later to think about all the hurts rising up in him. Here was the M&M’S machine that he would beg to have quarters for. The cast-iron woodstove. On stormy nights when the electricity was out, we’d sit here on the couch, in front of the stove. Me and Dad. He taught me to read. Shadows capered over the wood. The cops, when they came, had cut the couch cushions open with a knife and searched inside. Overturned the bookcase. Upended the Coke machine. Opened the stove and dug through the ashes.