Theresa hadn’t spoken to her father in fifteen years. He had been a hard man and a heavy drinker, and when she left home at nineteen, she swore she was done. She never knew he had gotten so sick. Jace had found him by accident, through an old address on a birthday card in Theresa’s closet. When he drove out to see him, he found an old man with early dementia, a cold trailer, and an empty refrigerator.

Jace couldn’t walk away, and he couldn’t tell his mother either. So every weekend, he and Logan slept on the floor of that trailer, cooked soup, washed dishes, fixed the leaking roof, and made sure the old man took his pills. That was why Logan always came home exhausted and headed straight for the shower. They had pooled their part-time paychecks to buy his groceries. Logan’s careful pizza texts were sent from that trailer.