When he woke, it was dark and Patty was snoring on the sofa. Mike Jr. was near his feet in the nest of blankets. Eddie pushed at the boy’s shoulder with the toe of his shoe. His own legs were wobbly. He had to hold on to the coffee table to stand. Mike Sr. wasn’t there.

Eddie stood at the window facing the street. The dark inside the house was deeper than the dark outside, and it took a moment for his eyes to adjust. There were people moving out there. A big group of them. Some had backpacks—some pulled heavy-looking suitcases on wheels. He tried to speak, but his voice was splintery and stabbed his throat, making him cough. He grabbed for the wall but it was slick and he slid down and continued coughing on the floor. There was a pain deep in his side that felt like something tearing. He squeezed to keep it whole until the coughing fit had passed.

When he could stand, he opened the door, but the street had emptied out. He walked out into the night. How long had he been on the floor? The sky had the whitish tint of dawn. It was hot out there, but maybe the house was hotter. Had he seen them? Those people in the street? The memory had sunk beneath the clarity of his vision like a coin to the bottom of a pool.

In the living room, Laura was sitting up. Mike Jr. was in her lap and she was bent over him as though he were a much smaller child. The way she cradled his head made him look like a corpse she’d lifted off the ground.

“Laura,” he said.

She rocked Mike Jr. and his head lolled.

“Laura. Put him down.”

Mike Jr.’s eyes flashed open, and Eddie caught his breath, stepping back.

“He’s sick,” Laura said.

“It’s okay,” Eddie said. “You can put him down.”

“I have to take care of him. I’m responsible this time.”

He saw that she was dreaming.

He touched her shoulder and she flinched.

“It’s okay,” he said.

She looked down at the boy in her arms. His eyes had the unhinged quality of blindness.

“How you doing, buddy?” Eddie asked.

Mike Jr. was silent and didn’t redirect his gaze.

“I don’t remember it,” Laura got out. “Picking him up.”

“You were concerned,” Eddie said. “It’s okay to be concerned about him.”

He took Mike Jr. and placed him back down on the blankets on the floor.

“Lie down,” he said to Laura. “Rest. It’s night. We’ll start over in the morning.”

“Okay,” she said, and when she was down, he knelt beside her and stroked her hair again. He bent to kiss her ear, and felt her hair at his mouth. It was still coarse and strong.

She slept, and he went back and stood at the window. There was no one in the street, but he watched as if he could produce the vision again. They’d been leaving the neighborhood, leaving their homes, and Eddie had not gone with them. When he shut his eyes he could feel the asphalt beneath his shoes, could feel himself running through the night—that old buoyant joy of sprinting through late-summer streets.

But they were gone.

He had missed them.

The salsa jar on the counter was empty except for a residue. He tipped it to his mouth and got out a few sour drops. When the retching came, he went to the sink. His stomach tightened and he spat out a brownish gob.

There was only baking soda in the fridge, and he got a spoonful of it and put it in his mouth. It stayed powdered until he worked it around. After a minute or so, it turned into a paste that he could swallow. It would settle his stomach, at least.

A flashlight was magnetized to the door of the freezer and he clicked it on. He expected to see Mike Sr. sleeping in the next room—a dining room with a polished wooden table—but the room was empty. The hallway was empty, too. There was a linen cupboard at the end of the hall, and on a top shelf, a box of bandages and ointments. A bottle of liquid cold medicine. Eddie unscrewed the cap and held it to his nose. He had to breathe in hard to smell the orangey syrup, children’s strength.

In the living room, he pried Mike Jr.’s mouth open and pressed the plastic bottle against his teeth. When the liquid touched the back of his throat, he swallowed, and kept on swallowing. There was more in the bottle than Eddie had realized, but he continued to hold it to Mike Jr.’s mouth.

When the bottle was empty, he sat beside Mike Jr. and touched the boy’s silken hair, letting it float electrically between his fingers. It took a long time for Eddie to check on the boy’s breathing. He pressed in close, but Mike Jr.’s little chest didn’t rise or fall. Eddie put a hand to the boy’s mouth and felt nothing—nothing coming from his nostrils, either.

Laura had turned onto her stomach, her hands at her sides as if she was going to push herself up. Her eyes were open. She was looking at him.

“Is he okay?” she asked.

Eddie listened to the quiet in the room. “Yeah,” he said. “He’s comfortable now.”

“Is he okay?” she repeated.

He tried to imagine their life together, what it had been—but he couldn’t.

He felt the warmth in the boy’s chest.

She lunged forward, reaching for Mike Jr., but she was too far away and only flopped down on the carpet.

“Please!” she sobbed.

She thrashed around there, but made no progress toward the two of them.

Eddie put his hand over her mouth, hushing her and squeezing her by the shoulder. “He’s not yours,” he said. He felt her tongue and teeth on his fingers. “He’s not yours,” he said again.

She rolled onto her back and looked up at the ceiling. Then she pressed her hands into her belly.

“Mine’s gone.”

“Don’t say that.”

He got her beneath her armpits and moved her toward the door.

“No,” she said. “Let go.”

“We shouldn’t be here,” Eddie said. “This is a family thing.”

Outside, they sat on the Davises’ deck. Eddie put his head down because it hurt to keep it lifted. The boards were hotter than the air, and pressed into his bones. His temple ached where it touched the wood. He needed to get onto the grass, but when he tugged on Laura’s arm, she didn’t budge.

“Leave me,” she told him.

“We can’t sleep here.”

“I can.”

“Come on, Laur.”

She was lying down, too. He got his arm under hers again, and when he tried to stand, his weight moved her forward. She groaned a little. Her head was near the edge of the porch, but it wasn’t hanging off.

“Okay,” he said. “I’m here. I’ll be right here.”

He went down to the grass and lay on it. It was as sharp as splinters, but he pretended it was cooler than the deck. The basement would be cooler, softer, but he couldn’t conceive making it back inside his own house. The basement might as well have been a mile away, ten miles away. His fingertips tingled, the insides of his elbows, too.

He looked up and saw Laura watching him from the porch. She was smiling. Maybe he’d done something funny. He was beneath the overpass, and he had fallen from high above. He’d covered himself up with ash again. The ash was warm and velvety on his skin.