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The nagging thought: did Broker like her this way; ripening like a pear…?

Dependent on him.

A lot of moms were in shape. Gym-rat skinny, Dad called it. But not like Mom used to be. For instance, other moms didn’t have the kinda purple gouge in their left hip and a bigger glob of purple scar on their butt. Where the E-ra-kee shot her during the war in the desert, the war before the one that was on TV now. The one before Kit was born. Didn’t have a big grinning skull-and-crossbones tattoo on their right shoulder.

Kit entered the bathroom cautiously, feeling her way into her mother’s mood. In a general way she understood that Mom wouldn’t get on her about the fight at school. She knew Mom didn’t have the strength for that right now.

“It’s okay, Little Bit,” Nina said, turned her warm green eyes on Kit, smiling in real life.

Kit brightened and smiled back. Mom only called her “Little Bit” when she was feeling pretty good. Auntie Jane had called her Little Bit. And Mom’s smile was only a little bit sad.

“So what’s this boy like, you got in the fight with?” Nina asked.

Kit made a face. “He’s a bully. He swears more than all the other kids put together. He knows the F word.”

“Hmmmm,” Nina mulled.

Kit tilted her head. “Can I say…hell?”

“Okaayy…” Nina drew it out, curious.

“Hell is a swear word. But no one says, ‘The H word.’ Why is that? And what’s the big deal about the F word?”

Nina fingered a snag in her hair and studied her daughter. “What do you think it means?”

“Don’t know. But it’s cool, because the older kids say it a lot.”

Nina put down the comb, wrapped a towel around her middle, came into the room, and sat on the bed. “Well, it’s complicated,” she said.

“That don’t sound like an answer. Sounds like another question,” Kit said.

“I don’t think you’re ready for this. You sure you really want to know?” Nina asked.

“I want to know,” Kit said, furrowing her forehead, attentive.

Nina scrunched her lips meditatively, “Okay. It’s like this. The F word is initials. Like your name: Karson Pryce Broker. The initials are K.P.B.-”

“Yeah,” Kit said.

“The F word is the same way. F.U.C.K. means ‘For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge.’”

“I don’t get it,” Kit said.

“It’s about…sex.”

Kit shook her head.

“Okay. Sex is a way of talking about making babies. Remember our talk about how Daddy and I made you?”

Kit’s face contorted, recalling the description of Dad’s testicles being full of swimmy things that swam out his penis into Mom’s vagina, hunting for this egg. She had looked at her father funny for a month after that.

“Mom, that’s gross.”

Nina nodded. “And so is the F word for someone your age.”

“I’m going to change the subject,” Kit said.

“Fine,” Nina said.

“Can we play the game?” Kit asks.

Nina smiled. “Okay.”

Days when Mom was feeling better, like now, she’d let Kit play dress-up on her, like she was a special doll. Something she would never have done last year in Italy. Kit would parade the clothes she’d selected. But first she’d comb Mom’s hair.

“I like it you’re letting your hair grow,” Kit said, gently drawing the comb through her mother’s hair, ratting out the snags.

Broker stood at the foot of the stairs and listened to the muted girl talk drifting down from Kit’s bedroom on a mist of hot water and body lotion. He smiled and sagged a little with relief, hearing the normal chatter. More and more there were these tiny healing moments, cutting back the bleak days.

He went back into the kitchen, where steam from the boiling kettle of pasta water had fogged the windows. When his girls came down for dinner, he saw that Kit had talked Nina into an artifact of her student days at the University of Michigan, this ancient flowing green jabala with threadbare gold embroidery. She had applied lipstick, dots of rouge, and streaked eyeshadow. Nina’s red hair, for years shorn mob-cap short, had grown to an ambiguous length two inches off her shoulders. Kit had pinned it with barrettes at odd angles. A single crude braid dangled from the left side of her forehead.

Nina managed a wry smile and rolled her eyes. Kit led her by the hand, pleased with her efforts.

Broker encouraged, smiled back. “All right, looking good. Kit, go wash your hands.” He placed a salad bowl on the set table, returned to the stove, thrust a ladle into the churning kettle, plucked a strand of pasta, took it in his fingers, and tossed it against the maple cabinet next to the stove, where it stuck in a curlicue.

Done.

“Al dente, bravo,” Kit said in approval, emerging from the half bath off the kitchen. Her expression changed, remembering something. She dashed from the room.

As Broker drained the noodles in the sink, he heard Kit running up the stairs. Nina moved in beside him, began to grate the Parmesan. Their elbows touched.

“You look like a harlot in that getup,” he said quietly.

For the first time in a long time, she sideswiped him with her hip.

“Hey,” he muttered, his voice close to faltering at the warm pressure of Nina’s flank nudging him.

She lowered her painted eyelids, pursed her painted lips. “Stay on task, Broker. You have to discipline your feral child, remember…punching that kid…”

“Right.” With a slight lump in his throat, he continued through the efficient stations of his kitchen kata, cleaning as he went, doling out the noodles and then the thick sauce, sprinkling on the cheese, pouring milk for Kit, water for Nina and himself. Placing the bottle of dressing next to the salad bowl.

Then he faced his wife across the table, over the relentless, perfectly executed meal he had prepared.

“Dad?” Kit’s voice lanced the moment, needling thin with alarm.

“What?” Broker turned.

“I can’t find Bunny.” Kit came into the kitchen, her forehead a washboard of wrinkles. “She’s not in my bed.”

Broker and Nina exchanged glances. The stuffed animal was a fixture at the dinner table. “Maybe she’s in the truck,” Nina said.

Broker nodded. Sometimes she took the stuffed animal to and from school, left it in the backseat. “Go check the truck. It should be open. And while you’re out there, bring Ditech back inside.”

Kit’s mood immediately rebounded. She darted out the door into the garage and called, “Hey, Ditech, where are you, you naughty kitty-”

Broker turned to Nina and raised his hands in a shrug. In less than a minute Kit was back, face bright with cold, her forehead still creased with concern.

“No Bunny. And Dad, there’s something wrong with the truck.”

Now Broker’s forehead was stamped with wrinkles. What?

“The tire’s flat,” Kit said. “And I can’t find Ditech. She’s gone.” Kit’s accusing tone brought Broker to his feet.

“Naw, she’s just hiding-”

“No, she isn’t. I don’t hear her bell. C’mere, look,” Kit demanded.

Broker followed Kit into the garage. She extended her arm, finger pointing.

Then he saw what she was pointing at as he felt the blast of cold air. The back door to the garage was open, filled with a sudden frenzy of snow.

“You left the door open,” Kit said. “There’s critters out there, and she’s just a little kitty.”