Saturday, January 4th

***

    When Milk crashed early that morning, he left the light on in his room. He hated to admit it, but he was freaked.

    When he awoke late morning, he found he had no lights. The LED display on the clock was blank and the room was kind of cold. Of course if he had no electricity, the furnace wasn’t much good. The fan that pushed the heat throughout the build­ing used electricity to run. He peeked out the bedroom window. Snow had built up against the sill a quarter of the way up. He could barely make out the yellow re­volving lights of the salt spreader just now making its way down the street. His car had to be buried beneath one of the giant snow hills out where the curb was supposed to be.

    If his watch was right, he was about three hours late for work. He needed to call someone now, but when he lifted the receiver he found that the phone service was knocked out as well. He’d have to use his cell phone, but that he left in the back seat of the Nova. Forget it. He’d never make it that far without employing a snow shovel. He had enough of shovels for a long while. Maybe he’d clean instead. There were enough clothes laying around to keep him washing for a couple of days, and at least every dish he owned was in the sink. He burned something in a sauce pan so long ago, he couldn’t remember what it was. Maybe he’d scrub that out while he waited for the utilities to come on again. Hell, maybe he’d pitch it.

***

    Red left the carafe where he found it. He made his coffee in an old percolator, and burned it, because he didn’t want to spend anymore time in the kitchen than he had to. He spent most of the day wandering from one room to the other. Without electricity and with the limited amount of light coming through the window while the worst of the storm blocked out the sun, the entire house took on an eerie pink glow.

    There wasn’t a room he didn’t see her in. The bedroom had the pink sheets that they had argued over. She had painted the kitchen walls, cabi­nets, counter and fridge pink. In the living room he found pink throw pillows. He hated them. When she bought them, he threatened to burn them. She insisted she’d buy more if he did. He submitted to them, just as he submitted to the pink dishes, the pink curtains, drapes and cushioned toilet seat. She even bought him a pink recliner. Good God, how he hated pink.

***

    Evelyn took many trips to the front window throughout the day. With each inch of snow to fall, and each circuit of the snow plow, she wondered again. And she prayed. Where was her daughter? ‘Dear God, please keep her safe and bring her home.’

    Pam called her into the den to watch the noon news. The anchor showed a pic­ture of Willow, and a description of her and a Hispanic male the police wanted to talk to. Police Chief Guilarmo Ramos said in a telephone interview that the police would help organize searches once the snow situation was under control. “Again, Willow Pratt. Police are asking that anyone with information concerning her whereabouts please contact the Portland Police Department.”

   “Hispanic male?” Pam asked. Her youngest daughter actually looked hopeful.     “You think?”

   “I hope.” Evelyn tried to smile. “He’d have to treat her better than Red does.”

***

    Sophie watched the boys scoot their vehicles back and forth on the kitchen floor as she cut up green pepper. Mikey al­ways carried two Matchbox cars in the pocket of his jacket at all times. He said that his big brother, Donny, had given them to him before he died. He had them out now. Cory had his big, soft trucks that he had gotten for Christmas. The differ­ence in the size of the vehicles they played with was a bit disconcerting. But then size didn’t matter, brothers did. Mikey would beep at Cory and the little one would beep back.

She put Bill’s call on the speaker so she could continue to work while she spoke to him. “What are you making?” Bill asked over the phone.

     “Spaghetti. Are you going to make it home?”

    “Good question. If worse comes to worse, maybe I can bunk next store. I’m sure the fire department has an extra bunk.”

    “Let me know so I’m not worried.”

    “No problem. You have electricity?”

    “Yeah. Why?”

    “Half of Portland is out.”

    She watched as Cory tugged on his brother’s sleeve and whispered in his ear. Mikey turned to look at her. “So, has it been busy?” she asked.

    He sighed. “Yeah, we’ve got a situation here. I’ll tell you about it when I see you. How’s the kids?”

    “Good. Mikey is here.”

    The ten year old smiled. “Hi, Bill!”

    “Hey, Mikey. So, Sophie, how come?”

  “I guess his grandma went down to see Marie yesterday. Didn’t make it back.”

    “Probably stranded.”

    “Probably.”

    “So, Mikey,” he called. “Think of me when you eat my share of dinner.”

    “I’m making enough for all of us,” she corrected.

    “Ha! Have you seen that kid eat? New Year’s you should have made one ham for him and one ham for the rest of us. Right, Mikey? Am I right?”

    His voice was happy and that made Mikey and Cory both laugh. “He’s right.       You’re right,” Mikey called. “I’m a growing boy!”

    “Growing right out of your pants.”

    Cory tugged on Mikey’s sleeve again. “What is it, Cory?” Sophie asked.

    “He says he doesn’t like when you put mushrooms in your spaghetti,” Mikey responded.

    “So why can’t Cory tell me that?” She turned to the youngest.

    The boy shrugged and pointed to his brother. “I like Mikey.”

    “You tell her, Cory,” Bill called. “Hey, Sophie. I hate mushrooms, too.”

    “Goodbye, Guilarmo.”

    “Goodbye, Sophia.”

    The boys chuckled as she hung up. She wondered then why she couldn’t keep all three kids. They had always wanted a family, and if God wasn’t to provide one way, why not this way?

    She remembered her wedding. Her maid of honor was nine months along, and went into labor during the reception. They moved the party to Robbinson Memorial, where Sophie, Bill, his best man and the best man’s fiancé shared a bottle of Champaign and discussed parenthood. When the father arrived to say that he had a healthy baby boy, they opened another bottle. The best man’s fiancé and the new mother were sisters. 

    Sophie pushed aside the memory, and tried to concentrate on abolitionists and John Brown.

***

    About dusk Red crept into the kitchen again. The carafe looked different. He wondered if it could have moved. He dumped the contents down the drain, and very carefully set it in its place on the coffee maker. At the doorway, he turned quickly. He sighed knowing it didn’t move, nor could it.

    Still wrapped in his blanket, he made it into the living room. He could swear those damned throw pillows had rearranged themselves. Maybe not. He shook that off and tried to remain resolute. In that light, everything was distorted. He sat on the sofa and listened. Every creak, every groan, every branch scratching against the siding or roof had him thinking about wolves, coyotes, deer, beavers, raccoons and ground squirrels. He wondered if she didn’t conspire with every animal in the forest preserve. Right now she’d have them convinced that they should scratch their way through the siding or the doors. Damn. If only he hadn’t killed the last of the beer the night before.

***

    Without lights, without the TV, without beer, and without an escape, Milk had time to think. Red drove him out of his mind. His best friend. Huh! That man was as ditzy as any broad he had ever met. Always getting his ass in hock. If Milk wasn’t dragging him home after a night of too much drink, he was breaking up a fight between him and Willie. Or him and Beverly at Pinkies’. Or him and some­one else. Little bastard didn’t know when to keep his mouth shut.

   Milk’s marriage fell apart because of Red. For that matter any real relationship he ever had went to hell because of Red. Several women, including his ex-wife have given him the ultimatum, Red or her. He knew he’d be better off with her, safer, out of trouble, but picked Red instead. The fact was Milk didn’t want the re­sponsibility of being husband, boyfriend or father. It was a hell of a lot easier to go to work every day, drink his beer, smoke a little weed, and straighten out Red’s screw ups.  

    He met Red when they worked together at another shipping company. He drove and Red was the company mechanic. Almost instantly, they clicked. Red got his nickname because of the color of his hair. He laughed hysterically over Milk’s. Of all names, why Milk? Milk couldn’t answer that. It was just one of those stupid tags he wore as a child that stuck. 

    Red reminded Milk of Lyle, his little brother. Lyle was another f-up. He was eighteen when he totaled his mother’s Caddy. According to his mother, if Milk was doing what he was supposed to, watching out for his brother, keeping his brother straight, the kid would have never went out that night and gotten plastered. He would still be alive.

***

    Angela committed to one more night at the Ramada. She had no choice. Street plows and salt spreaders crept up and down the main thoroughfare all day long. Once they passed, though, blowing snow closed the street one more time. She called home hoping to hear from Mikey, but instead got a recording informing her that line was temporarily disconnected. She tried Milk’s and got the same record­ing. Some of her friends had phone service, and some didn’t. Those who did told her to make herself comfortable because they weren’t going anywhere.

***

    He was cold, shivering even. Willow picked the blanket off the floor and tucked it in around him. He thanked her and promptly fell asleep again.

    Then he woke up. He shivered again, and pulled the blanket up closer to his face. He was still on the sofa. The street light showed pinkly through his living room window. That was enough to send him off to bed.

Sunday,

January 5th

    It finally quit snowing and the wind was dying down. Officer Jack Morgan again followed the snow plow and the salt spreader. The conditions had changed dramatically  First Jack scraped the snow from the windows of the cars that remained in the ‘two inch zone,’ and slapped orange tow stickers on the back windows. He spent his time wondering about stunned vehicle owners and what they would say when a tow truck showed up and carted their vehicles off.

    Later that night his job became to direct traffic about the City trucks. This time several dump trucks and a back loader joined them as they removed as much of the snow as possible from the business district. The plows piled snow five feet and higher at the curb, making it impossible to get to storefront doors. When he waved a car around the back loader, he wondered what the driver thought of this opera­tion. Surely the City wouldn’t foot the bill to remove snow from every residential street. At least the residential neighborhoods had grass in front of the homes, and a place to pile snow.

    Once a dump truck loaded, he directed it first to Calumet Park where a mountain of snow grew very quickly. That was a small park on Miami, next store to Twin Sisters’ Coffee House. Once they filled it up, he sent trucks on to parking lots and to the vacant land lining the Canal.

    There was more snow here than he had ever seen in his entire life. More, he bet, than that notorious storm in 1967 when Chicago was buried in twenty two inches. From what he heard, the entire area was crippled for days. His wife was too young to remember 1967, but his in-laws remembered. His mother-in-law taught at a Catholic grammar school at the time. Teachers and students alike spent two nights sleeping in church pews. Jack’s father-in-law told him how Chicago Mayor Richard J. Daley didn’t bother to order the side streets plowed.     It just wasn’t done then. The man had taken a train home from work that evening, and walked from the station. He followed tire tracks in the street. Luckily Jack’s wife stayed with her baby sitter for at least one full night.

    Jack and his mother were still in Ireland at the time, awaiting their exit visas. They immigrated to America that summer. Jack was very young.

    As Jack looked about him, he wondered what they’d do when they had the Canal lined on both sides. Surely when it all melted, the Canal wouldn’t be able to han­dle the run off. Portland sat on high ground. Most of the surrounding area didn’t. He could imagine the flooding that would occur in towns and farm land downstream. God help northeastern Illinois if it snowed again before this had a chance to melt.

    With that thought, he decided to ask for another assignment. He spent too much time alone. Desperately, he needed another human being to talk to. 

    He missed that red wagon earlier. It was buried so deep in snow, he wasn’t sure which end was which. ‘Forget it,’ he told himself, not wishing to either raise the owner’s ire further, or dig the snow out of another car window. He turned back to his vehicle which again sat on Miami.

    Just in case, he strained up over his squad. No one wanted to believe him about the deer running the length of Miami the night before. Would it be there? To his amazement, it was. It rounded the same corner and raced right up past him. To­night though, it had something in its mouth. It looked like hot pink printer paper. Huh. Probably picked it out of someone’s garbage. Jack watched it as it gracefully sped along, and how it just as gracefully turned onto the Elm Street, again. That night, though, Elm had been plowed.

    He turned about to where he had last seen the trucks, hoping that someone would have seen it. Damn it anyway. Most of them were down the street at White Cas­tle’s having coffee, and here he was, worrying about a stupid station wagon. He really needed a new assignment. That and hot coffee.

***

    Sophie slipped out of her nice warm bed, heading to the bathroom. She did what she had to and began her trip back to bed. She heard something coming from the direction of the front room. Living with a cop all these years had made her too brash, she chided herself as she picked up a heavy candle stick. She raised it over her head and slipped into the room. Something or someone occupied Bill’s favor­ite chair. She connected the familiar shape with other nights, and flipped on the lights.

    He hadn’t even removed his uniform jacket. “Come on,” she ordered shaking her husband. “Wake up and come to bed.”

    He groaned and glanced at her. He rubbed his eyes first, then nodded at her and then at her candle stick. “You planning on using that on me?” he asked tiredly.

    “It wouldn’t be the first time I’ve thought of it in twelve years.”

    He grunted.

    “You go out after work?” she asked nodding at the beer by his side.

    He shook his head. “Ain’t nothing open, Sophie, dear. Even if I wanted to I couldn’t.” He picked up his bottle and swirled it. He hadn’t drank much before falling asleep. He took one quick sip, and then allowed her to pull him up and lead him off towards the bedroom. “Damn, what a day.”

    “That bad?”

    “Did you see the news tonight?”

    “No, why?”

    They entered the first bedroom located just off the dining room. Bill slipped his jacket off, and began working on his belt. He wrapped his weapon and holster up in its belt and tucked it into a metal box he kept locked and on the upper shelf in his closet. “You know Willow Pratt?” he asked.

    “Pratt? Pratt?” She frowned as she thought. “I had a Pamela Pratt a few years back. Shawna, too. Sisters.”

    “Willow, too. Another sister, older one. Anyway,” he yawned between words as he pulled his white shirt from his pants, “Willow disappeared. Threatened her boy friend that if he didn’t marry her she’d find someone else.”

    “You think she did?”

    He shook his head. “Always a possibility. Haven’t spoken to the boy friend yet.”

    She dug a pair of pajamas out of his drawer. Didn’t do much good. Once his pants hit the ground, Bill crawled into bed wearing just his briefs and a T-shirt. He was out again before she could remind him about the kids.

***

    This time he found her at the foot of his bed. Those damned animals were chattering away at her side, looking his way and nodding. Damn, they looked hungry, too. She showed them a small statuette of a pink deer. And she smiled. She nodded at the dresser where she had her mirrored tray and another example of pink porcelain. This time it was a trinket box. She kept earrings in there. Her cheap earrings, because God only knows he’d never allow her to buy anything worth any money that she could lose. Not that she ever lost anything. Well, okay, she lost the one boot. But there were other things. She still had those pink birth­day statues that she got for each birthday. She still had the pink seashell neck­lace her father brought her from Florida when she was in high school. And she had earrings to match....

    Damn! No more! He shook himself awake, pulling himself out of bed and spin­ning about. “Stop it, Willie! Stop! Now! No more!” He jumped at the dresser. The deer statuette was there and so was the trinket box. That was it. It was all going. He ran to the kitchen, and dug in the cabinet under the sink. He had a roll of gar­bage bags somewhere.

    Once he had it, he returned to his room. He shook one open and held it as he be­gan tossing her shit in there. First her statuettes, and then her trinket box went. He made sure he smashed everything breakable. He pulled clothing from her drawers and even the sheets from his bed. He wouldn’t stop there either. Take the blankets and the drapes. Take the toilet seat and even those awful pillows. And the coffee maker! That would go too!

***

    Milk’s phone rang and startled the hell out of him. He was getting used to the quiet. When he picked it up, he found Angela Bankencrest at the other end. “You did check on Mikey, right?”

    “No, why would I?”

    “I left you two messages. I said for you to check on him. Where is he? I can’t get him at home.”

    “I have no idea where he is. Why isn’t he with you? And where are you?”

   “I’m at a hotel outside of Joliet. I got stranded here on the way back from seeing Marie. I said...”

    “I don’t care what you said. I didn’t get the damned messages. The electricity went out.”

    She paused. “Hopefully he’s with Tyler.”

    “You don’t know?”

    “No, I don’t know. I called you.”

    “I didn’t get the damned messages. You lost my kid!”

    “Oh, now turn it back on me. You should have answered your phone and we wouldn’t be in this mess.”

    Milk grunted and pulled the phone away from his face. He cradled it against his chest and tried very hard to get his anger under control. After a few deep breaths, he replaced the phone to his ear. “You know something, you old bat. It’s this stu­pid attitude of yours that drove Marie away from home to begin with. I should know better than allow you to take my kid. I should of kept him myself.”

    “Oh, yes. He could watch you and that buddy of yours, that Red jackass, get crocked every night you’re in town.” She paused as her words sunk in. Truly she had to be one of the bitterest women he had ever met. No wonder Marie was so angry. “Come pick me up,” she ordered. “I’m at the Ramada Inn just west of Joliet on I-80.”

    “I gotta do something first.” He hung up without saying goodbye. God only knows what happened to Mikey. Once he found the kid he’d blister his ass for getting the old bat so worked up.

***

    When Bill awoke on Sunday morning, he could smell bacon frying and pancakes cooking. He donned a fresh pair of jeans and went looking for his wife. He found her and hugged her, and she shoved a piece of coffee cake in his mouth. He curled his lip in disgust as she pulled away. It was one of those Scandinavian things made with cardamom. It wasn’t cinnamon and it wasn’t anise. It was gross. 

    “Did you stop last night, or not?” she asked as she retreated to the coffee maker.

    “I told you nothing was open last night.”

  “So, in other words you would have. You stop at Joe’s or something? Mark’s?”

    “Nope.”

    “Elliot’s?”

    “No, I worked late. Then I came home.”

  She turned back to him and studied him as she stirred his coffee. “You promise?”

    “I promise.”

   God help him, but he’d been warned. Women never forget. Prior to his promo­tion to this job, he served as lieutenant on second shift. By the time his shift ended, she had been in bed for hours. Out of loneliness more than anything else, he began frequenting Pinkies’. He gained weight, he spent money he could have used elsewhere, he made a fool out of himself more times than he cared to remember, and he nearly wrecked his marriage. She began divorce proceedings, and only put them aside when this promotion came through. “I’ll be home,” he told her, “Almost every night. No more Pinkies’, no more drunks.” It meant more than life itself to him to keep this together. He kept his word.

    He fell in love with her when they met way back in kindergarten. They made friends immediately, and stayed good friends right through high school and col­lege. Later, after Sophie had begun teaching and he had spent a few years on the police department, the pair hooked up at her brother’s wedding. They were older, their lives were stable, and neither was involved with anyone. Sophie said it best. At that time in their lives, the best and the brightest were already married. And here she was waiting for Mr. Right, and she wasn’t willing to settle for just any­one. If what it took to make it as a married couple was to establish a friendship, than maybe they had something to build on. She suggested it and he was willing. Without actually dating, they decided on a date and got married. It worked.

    They wanted children right from the beginning. It wasn’t to be. Sophie became pregnant twice, but miscarried both times. When the opportunity came up to be­come foster parents, they jumped at it. 

    They accepted several children on a temporary basis, but it was Tina and Cory that they formed their concept of family about. It was wrong, they told each other. Their mother would be released one day and claim them. Then what? They’d both be devastated.

    “Bill!” Mikey ran the length of the house, into the old kitchen. “You’re on TV!”

    “I am?”

    “They’re talking about Willie! You know Willie, right? You guys are on TV!”

    “You know Willow Pratt?” Bill asked with surprise.

    “Sure. She’s my Dad’s friend.”

   “Oh.” Of course. She was reportedly dating Mikey’s father’s best friend. Even her mother said that the police should talk to Milk Borenstein.

Sophie turned to the kitchen portable. While her back was turned, he handed Mikey his coffee cake. Mikey curled up his lip and set it on the table. She found the right station immediately, and with it, a photo of his face appeared alongside of a photo of Willow Pratt’s.

    “She looks just like her sisters,” Sophie commented. She glanced back at him, immediately focusing on the coffee cake. “Don’t waste that.”

    He scrunch up his nose. “Sophie, I hate cardamom.”

    “You do?”

    “Yes, I do.”

    “When did you plan to tell me?”

    “Every time you force me to eat that crap. You eat it.”

    She shrugged. “I don’t like it either. I always bought it because you liked it.”

***

    Karolyn Mathers watched the noon news. She was moved by the picture of the missing person. The young lady was certainly pretty. Sad what her parents must be going through. Karolyn was moved by the plea from the local po­lice chief. Moved enough, she assured herself, to make the journey into the south suburbs when they asked for search volunteers.

***

    Milk struggled down the unshoveled front walk and up onto the porch. It kind of surprised him that Red hadn’t shoveled. The bastard was cheap, but he wasn’t lazy. On the porch, Milk heard screaming coming from inside. He jerked opened the door, and hurried in.

    “You hear me, Willie! I don’t need this crap!” Red stood in the middle of the living room with a full bag in one hand and a pillow that he threatened the ceiling with. “No more pink! I hate pink! And no more dreams, Willie! I hate your dreams! And I hate your cute little animals! I don’t want to see them here. You got that, Willie! Don’t send them here!”

    “What the hell is your problem?” Milk shouted over the noise.

    “Huh?” Red turned quickly. He stood there in his greasy work pants and a  T-shirt. Mud streaked his pant legs and one cheek. Coagulated blood stained his ear and down his neck. His hands were gray where caked on mud had cracked off. He was just as filthy as he was when Milk left the other night. The bag he held was pink from the things inside reflecting through the white bag. Red shoved the pillow deep into the bag and reached for another. “No more pink,” he hissed at Milk. “No more. I told you. I hate pink!”

***

    Angela made a couple of phone calls, and then checked out. She used her Visa to pay for the room. She moved into the lobby where she waited. And waited. And waited. When the counter help changed shifts, a porter asked her if he could help. “No, thank you. I’m waiting for my ride.” She checked her watch. ‘Damnit, but he should have been here.’

***

    Bill got the snow blower out right after breakfast. He cleared the apron in front of the garage, and then the sidewalk leading from the garage to the front of the house, along the front walk, and up to the steps. Sophie swept the big brick porch.

    There was more snow than he ever remembered. This morning, the weather lady reported that eighteen inches fell all together. In 1967, twenty two inches fell. Bill couldn’t remember 1967. Only that every year in the middle of January some old timer came on TV and reminisced about how deep it was or how he had been stranded somewhere.

    Looking up the street, he witnessed something that probably began in ‘67. Neighbors were lugging their kitchen chairs, lawn chairs and folding chairs to the front of their houses, and setting them up to move into the street to hold their parking places once they moved their vehicles. It was illegal, but try and stop them. Most of them looked Bill’s way, growled, but continued on. He thanked God his garage opened onto the Big Oak Drive, was big enough to hold two cars, and accessible. No chairs for him.

***

   If Milk could have gotten his hands on a tranquilizer, a dart gun, or something sharp and deadly, he’d use it. Red was so worked up, Milk was terrified. After tearing out all that was hers in the house, the bastard fought his way through snow drifts out to the garage. He began shoving things on top of the work bench, or throwing them out the open door and into the snow.

    “That’s it!” Red cursed. “This bitch is staying down. I’m not giving her half a chance of digging herself out of her hole. Not her, not her wolf friends, or deer, or squirrels, or anyone else. She’s staying put!” Red found a number of bags and a wheelbarrow.

    “You can’t do that yet,” Milk insisted. “It’s too wet.”

   Red didn’t respond. He dumped a bag of sand and one of cement into the wheel­barrow. Milk gave in and grabbed a couple of buckets from a snow bank. He returned to the house for water. He traveled back and forth several times before Red had mixed enough cement mix, sand and water in the wheel barrow to begin the process. Red mixed, Milk toted water back and forth, Red poured and Milk smoothed. They cemented the feet of the workbench right into the floor. In the midst of all this activity, Milk wondered if the dummy knew the correct proportions of sand to cement mix to water. When they finished, Red pranced about in the doorway, pointing at the floor and spinning back at the snow. “That’s it. That’s one bitch out of my life forever. No more. No more pink! She can’t rag on me for anything.”

   Milk glanced over his shoulder. The next store neighbor strolled down his shoveled walk to his garage. The guy was probably enjoying the hell out of Red’s little display. Milk curled up as he remembered. “Oh, crap. F-ing Angela.”

    By the time she crawled in his car, she her complexion was so red, that her bleached blonde hair looked white. She didn’t speak right away and that was fine with him. But then when he entered I-80 again, she opened up. “Well, I found him. The kid has more sense than his father.”

    “Where is he?”

    “Ramos’s. When the lights went out and it got cold, he went over there. They had lights and heat.”

    “Ramos?” Milk turned about, staring at her in horror. “My kid is with that prick?”

    “That prick and his wife fed him and kept him warm while you were doing God knows what.”

    “Believe me,” Milk cried as he tried to focus on the road and her at the same time, “God knows what I’ve been up to. None of your f-ing business. As far as my kid goes, I don’t want him around those people.” He leaned towards her. A horn dragged his attention back to the road. He swerved back into his lane just in time to avoid hitting that car.

   “Hump.” She set her shoulders and scowled. “They’re decent law abiding people. They’re only crime is that they aren’t white.”

    “No, they’re not.” Milk turned hard on Angela. “I don’t need Mikey hanging around with people like that. And I don’t want him around those other two crumb snatcher grandkids of yours. He can stay with his own kind.”

    “That’s not what you said when Marie was home and watching all three. As long as there’s someone to pick up after you. That’s all you need. Another mama...”

*

    Angela entered the great brick porch and knocked on Ramos’s front door. It didn’t have a screen. That didn’t make any sense. The door should have a screen door. She caught a glance of someone peeking out the drapes in the window just to her side. A moment later Tina and Cory together answered the door.

   As much as the woman wanted to pretend, she had to admit that Tina’s features were very much like Marie’s. She was a pretty child. She had a tiny, square face, and thin nose and small lips. Angela was really kind of amazed that the kid didn’t look blacker.

    Cory was a darker copy of Donny, Marie’s eldest. Donny was a sweet child. What happened to him should never happen to any child. He had to be forced, that was all. No child with as much sweetness in him as Donny had would willingly lend himself to such a plot.

    Angela reached out at first to touch Cory, but then retreated. “I’m here to pick up Mikey,” she said sternly.

    Tina ran off. “Mikey! Grandma is here!”

    Cory crossed his arms and watched Angela. ‘What an odd child,’ she thought.

   A few minutes passed without anyone inviting her in. Mikey came then. He paused just inside the entrance hall, and hugged a blonde woman. “Bye, Bill,” he called into the living room.

    “Hey, Mikey, take it easy. Behave yourself,” a man responded.

    “I will.”

  Tina rushed to him and hugged him. Cory latched onto the boy when he entered the entrance hall. “I love Mikey! Don’t go!”

    “Hey, Dude, I love you, too. I’ll be back. Right, Grandma?” Mikey smiled at her.

    “Hurry up. Your father is waiting.”

  Instantly the joy disappeared from his face. His shoulders slumped, and Marie’s angry scowl appeared. He pushed his little brother aside, and stepped out onto the porch.

    “I hate you, Grandma!” Cory called. “I hate when Mikey sad!”

    “Cory!” the blonde woman corrected. “You apologize now.”

    The boy crossed his arms again. “Sorry.”

   The woman pulled the little one aside, and smiled at Angela. She closed the door then.

*

    The porch blocked the wind, stopping it from entering the house through the front door. It was still cold, and that cold radiated in. Sophie was concerned about her little one catching pneumonia, but more than that was his behavior. “I’m really surprised you said that,” she commented. “You hate Grandma? Is that what a good boy tells someone?”

    The boy nodded. “Gramma a bitch.” He set his mouth and walked away, leaving Sophia stunned.

*

    Mikey crawled into his father’s car and sat in the back seat. The old man didn’t say a thing. He stared out the front window and grunted when Grandma closed the passenger side door. When they arrived at Grandma’s house, Dad shut the car off and came in. That could mean anything. But when Dad took his belt off, Mikey knew he was in for the worst. 

Link to January 6th