I clicked the kid’s door shut and let out a breath I’d been holding since the first page of Goodnight Moon. The hallway was dark, just the faint glow of the night-light bleeding under his door, and the whole house smelled like grilled steak and red wine gone sour in the glass Mrs. C had left on the counter. She’d stumbled upstairs twenty minutes earlier, muttering about a headache, wine sloshing over the rim, her bare feet slapping the hardwood. Mr. C was supposed to be at poker night. His truck was still in the driveway, headlights off, engine ticking as it cooled.
I padded into the kitchen barefoot, the tile cold under my soles, and reached for a glass in the cabinet above the sink. The fridge light spilled out when I opened it, hit my legs, my tiny cotton shorts, the way they cut high
