I couldn’t hear Harold’s answer.
His parents were in Arizona. His sister lived in Boston with three teenagers who wouldn’t be caught dead staying in his guest room.
So, who was the family?
I stood there clutching a cocktail napkin I didn’t remember picking up, feeling the ground beneath the pool deck shift ever so slightly.
I turned toward Harold again, and the memory of his drained expression when Mia spoke became sharper into something I wasn’t ready to name.
I felt the ground beneath the pool deck tilt.
I stood several feet behind Harold, waiting for his conversation with Benjamin to pause.
Suddenly, almost against my will, my gaze lifted toward the back of his ear, and I replayed Mia’s words.
At first, there was nothing. Just skin, the edge of his collar, and a little graying hair he’d been allowing to grow longer over the past few months.
