She gazed into the dark, her pale skin glowing in the moonlight. Almost cerulean. Her hair was tangled and unkempt. “We can’t make it good. Nothing is good. Nothing ever will be.”

“I can get help,” he said. “I can take you to a doctor.”

“You think I want help?”

“They have places you can go.”

“I don’t want help.”

“What about Matty?”

“I’m all used up. There’s nothing left for him. Or you.”

“You’re his mom.”

She shook her head. “I am nobody’s wife. I am nobody’s mom.”

“Matty needs you.”

“I don’t care.”

“Please, Mom.”

She looked at him then, her eyes mauve. At once clouded and lucid-bright from all the pills. “You know what I used to think? All those years? Before I learned better?”

“Shh, Mom. Please.”

“Letters from your dad. He’d say he was coming home. That we’d all be together. Do you know how many times I believed him?”

He watched her, silent. Ignore it. The twisting in your gut.

Ignore it.

She lifted the joint to her lips and drew in a slow breath. Exhaled the smoke. “I used to sleep to dream of him, but I don’t dream like that anymore. In the dreams he came home and stayed, but now I know different. He is not coming home, and we are alone in this world, and no dream is going to change it. You know that, don’t you? He’s never coming home.”

“He could get parole.”

She shook her head, laughed.

“You have to keep hoping.”

She shook her head.

“He’s gone. But Matty’s here. I’m here.”

“You just don’t get it. You think your love is strong enough to make me quit. But it isn’t. I don’t care. I don’t care. Can’t you see? I have a new family.”

“You mean the pills.”

“I mean the pills.”

“You have to try, Mom. You’re hurting yourself.”

She shook her head.

“You’re going to die.”

“Oh yes, I am. And I hope for it. With all my heart.”

“And what am I supposed to tell Matty?”

She smiled briefly. It was almost unbearable. “You live with your soul and you die with your soul. And my soul is dead. I’m already dead.”

He tried to breathe.

Mom is sick. She just needs some help.

“You have to try, Mom. Lots of people who get addicted recover. Don’t shake your head. I’ll get a job to pay the bills, and we’ll be okay. You’ll see. We’ll be happy again. Me and you and Matty.”

She fixed her gaze on him. Whisper of wind. Shadows unfolding themselves from the darkness behind her. “You look like him,” she said. “I hate you for it.”

For a moment he stood there, shaking. This glass heart.

He left without looking back.