She squeezed his hand.

“We find out.”

Winter settled over Sorrow Creek.

The house changed.

Not dramatically.

Not all at once.

That was not how broken homes healed.

They healed in ordinary increments.

A repaired window.

Clean blankets.

Bread cooling on a shelf.

Laughter returning to rooms that had forgotten the sound.

Thomas began attending school in town twice a week, though he insisted he was too old.

Cade became responsible for the chickens and complained every morning.

Eli discovered books.

Porter proved gifted with horses.

Reeve remained quiet but started drawing pictures on scraps of feed paper.

Rue abandoned cooking.

Completely.

“I retired,” he informed Nora.

“At four?”

“Hard life.”

By Christmas, Harlan moved back into the house.

Not into Nora’s room.

Not yet.

But close enough that sometimes they talked after everyone else slept.

They spoke about Eleanor.

At first carefully.

Then openly.

Nora learned her sister had hated thunder.

Loved peppermint.

Cheated shamelessly at cards.

Once chased a rattlesnake out of the pantry using Harlan’s boot.

Harlan learned Nora had once broken Eleanor’s nose during a childhood wrestling match.

“Accidentally,” Nora insisted.

Harlan looked skeptical.

Mostly they learned that grief changed when shared.

It did not become smaller.

It became less lonely.

On Christmas morning, Thomas handed Nora a parcel.

Inside was the cedar box.

The initials remained burned across the lid.

N.C.

Nora looked at him.

“I thought those meant Nora Callaway.”

Thomas smiled.

“So did I.”

She frowned.

“What did they mean?”

“Mother told me once.”

He pointed to the initials.

“Nora and Children.”

Nora laughed.

“That makes no sense.”

“She said you’d understand.”

“I do not.”

Thomas shrugged.

“She said family doesn’t always arrive in the right order.”

Nora touched the letters.

Her throat tightened.

Later that afternoon she walked alone to Eleanor’s grave.

It stood on a hill overlooking the ranch.

Snow covered the prairie.

Nora brushed white powder from the stone.

ANNA GREER

Below it:

Beloved Wife and Mother

Nora removed a small chisel from her coat.

Harlan had offered to do it.

She refused.

Carefully, beneath the existing name, she carved two additional words.

ELEANOR CALLAWAY

Then below them:

BELOVED SISTER

She sat beside the grave until sunset.

“I was angry with you,” she whispered.

Wind moved through the dry grass.

“I still am, some days.”

Her eyes filled.

“You should have written sooner.”

She laughed softly.

“I suppose you did.”

Nora looked down at the ranch.

Smoke curled from the chimney.

Six boys ran through snow near the barn.

Harlan stood on the porch.

Waiting.

For her.

Not Eleanor.

Her.

Nora touched the cold stone.

“You were wrong about one thing.”

The wind lifted a strand of her hair.

“They didn’t need someone to save them.”

She watched Thomas tackle Cade into the snow.

Rue jumped on both of them.