I flung open the front door barefoot, and the cold hit me like a slap. He was still standing there under the porch light, roller dripping black onto the driveway. My father. Seventy-three years old, in a hoodie I had bought him for Christmas, two miles from the apartment where he was supposed to be asleep.

“Dad?” I whispered. He turned and gave me the same easy smile he used to give me when I was little and caught him sneaking cookies before dinner. “Hey, kiddo,” he said. “Go back to bed. I’m almost finished.” Then he dipped the roller again and said the words that made my knees give out. “Your mother hates it when this door is white. I have to fix it before she wakes up.” My mother had been dead for nine years.