“What does that even mean? Home is just a soft place to land in between adventures, or trouble, or what the hell ever. It’s a harbor, not an anchor. Be brave, see the world, every forest and mountain, and know you always have a safe place to rest and come back to. Muir, you can’t see the paradigm if you’re in it.”

“I don’t know what a paradigm is.”

“Forest for the trees. You’ve been telling yourself this story for so long, that you can’t depend on anyone in the world but yourself, and yes, you come rightly by it, and you’ve kept yourself alive that way. But try to see outside that story, and for God’s sake, don’t let fear lie to you. Joellen is here, just like she’s always been. Your friends are here. I’m here. A home doesn’t have to be a trap. Muir, I don’t feel sorry for you. I just love you.”

“I can’t,” I said.

“You can. I’m here now.”

“You’re too late.”

I lay down on the porch then, my head on her knees, and cried.

“I’m so tired,” I sobbed.

She did not talk. She patted my hair and gave me tissues from her pocket. Such a mom thing, tissues always at the ready.

“I don’t care how bad your last therapist was,” she said. “We’ll find you a good one, and it will change your life. Okay?”

I nodded into her knee. “What if I grow up and decide I do want to find my mom?”

“Then I’ll help you. I’ll do everything I can, and we’ll find her. Or we won’t. Either way, I’ll be with you, because as long as you’re breathing, nothing is ever too late. I don’t want to hear you say that again, understand? We do not talk or think that way in our house.”

Terry Johnson was worried. He sat on Francine’s lap to lick my face.

The Salish Sea was salty in the evening air. The flowers beneath my window nodded in the breeze beneath the flitting bats. I sat up.

She moved my hair off my face. “Oh! Oh, I forgot, I have something for you. I need to…” She got up and went in the house.

Terry Johnson whimpered but stayed with me.

“I don’t know, man.” I rubbed his ears. “She’s your mom.”

She came back out, sat on the steps beside me, and said, “Lift your hair up.”

She put something cool, a delicate gold chain, around my neck, and fastened it.

The chain.