I reached down between the cracked vinyl cushions and pulled it out.
It was a heavy brass fountain pen with a tarnished blue barrel, its clip slightly bent from years of being carried in a shirt pocket. I held it up to the gray light of the windshield.
This was Josh’s pen, the one he used for the grocery lists and the oil change dates on the calendar in the hallway. He had been gone four years, but the blue barrel still smelled faintly of his pipe tobacco.
I rubbed my thumb over the engraved initials near the cap. The metal was cold, holding the chill of the car’s interior.
I shoved the pen into my jacket pocket and turned the key. The nineteen ninety-eight Buick LeSabre rumbled to life, the rusted rear bumper vibrating against the tailpipe.
I backed out onto Maple Street without looking at the brick ranch house in the rearview mirror.
The radiator in my living room hissed, a steady stream of dry heat rising against the yellowed wallpaper of my small apartment. Noah sat on the edge of my kitchen table, his heavy work boots hooked around the bottom rung of the stool.
