“Every single day. But she’s out there somewhere, no doubt still stubborn as a mule.” She shook her head. “Mom used to say, ‘That girl can do anything if she puts her mind to it,’ and it looks like she was right. There’s no way I’d have had the courage to walk away from my father the way she did. She was very brave. But I still wish things had turned out different. You two would have been great together, although you and Kate were, too.”

“You knew Kate?”

“Of course,” Fiona said, nodding enthusiastically. “We met when she was out running and I was, well, trying to. Getting fit was a New Year’s resolution, except it was June by then, and I could barely walk up the stairs without needing an oxygen mask. But in all seriousness, we got talking and the next thing I knew, she’d taken me from couch potato to running five miles without breaking a sweat.” Her eyes glistened and she dabbed at them quickly. “She was an amazing person. Kind, funny, generous...for whatever reason her favorite thing was knock-knock jokes.”

“I wish I could remember. I’ve only seen a couple of pictures.”

“This might help.” She grabbed her phone, fingers flicking across the screen. “I took this on Kate’s birthday a few years before...”

She didn’t finish her sentence and I leaned in as Fiona brought up a video. In it, Kate sat at a table with a sparkly pink birthday hat on her head, grinning from ear to ear, her long brown hair swishing as she clapped her hands, oohing and aahing as a giant, sprinkle-covered chocolate cake complete with lit candles was set down on the table in front of her. I stared at the screen, hoping for this one thing to make everything else fall back into place but, once again, nothing happened.

As I tried to get a better look, a familiar voice said, “Happy birthday, babe,” and cake bearer Keenan bent over and kissed Kate on the lips.

“Shit,” Fiona said, pulling the phone away, her face reddening. “I forgot about that part.”

“It’s all right, Maya mentioned they dated,” I said as she grimaced some more, giving me an apologetic shrug, and I decided to push for a bit more information. “She didn’t mention how long for, though.”

“About a year, on and off, when she first moved to town.” Fiona slid her phone back into her pocket. “But she left him, and a few months after that she started seeing you. She really cared for you, and you seemed to, I don’t know, click, I suppose, way more than she and my brother ever had. Don’t get me wrong, I love Keenan and all, but you saw how he acted at the gas station. Sorry about that again.”

I wondered if I should mention his house call, decided not to. “Not your fault.”