Big Sky River. Linda Lael Miller

your own, Boone Taylor, because I didn’t just fall off the turnip truck.

      She’d signed the message with a large O.

      Boone set the slip of paper back on the table and carried a now-wakeful Fletch into the one and only bathroom. He set the boy on the lid of the toilet seat and started water running into the tub, which, thanks to Opal, was well scrubbed. Boone always showered, and that seemed like a self-cleaning type of operation, so he rarely bothered with the tub.

      Fletch, realizing where he was, and with whom, rubbed both eyes with small grubby fists and immediately started to cry again.

      “Hey,” Boone said quietly, turning to crouch in front of him the way he’d done earlier, in Molly’s kitchen. “Everything’s going to be all right, Fletcher. After a bath and a good night’s sleep, you’ll feel a whole lot better about stuff, I promise.”

      He’d told the boys, during the first part of the drive back from Missoula, that their uncle Bob, hurt the way he was, would need lots of care from their aunt Molly and the cousins, so that was why they were going back to Parable to bunk in with him for a while. It was the best way they could help, he’d explained.

      Griff hadn’t said anything at all in response to his father’s short and halting discourse. He’d just looked out the window and kept his thoughts to himself, which, in some ways, concerned Boone more than Fletcher’s intermittent outbursts. The littlest boy had exclaimed fiercely that he wanted to go back and help take care of Uncle Bob for real, and would Boone just turn around the truck right now, because Missoula was home, not Parable. When Boone had replied that he couldn’t do that, Fletch had cried as if his heart had been broken—and maybe it had.

      After quite a while, during which Boone felt three kinds of useless and just kept driving because he knew the kid would have resisted any kind of fatherly move, like stopping the truck and taking him into his arms for a few minutes, Fletcher’s sobs gradually turned to hiccups. That went on for a long time, too, like the crying, before he finally fell into a fitful sleep, exhausted by the singular despair of being five years old with no control over his own fate.

      Now, in this run-down bathroom, with the finish peeling away from the sides of a tub hardly big enough to accommodate a garden gnome, and the door off the cupboard under the sink letting the goosenecked pipe and bedraggled cleaning supplies show, Boone waited, still sitting on his haunches, for Fletcher’s response to the tentative promise he’d made moments before.

      It wasn’t long in coming. “Everything won’t be all right,” Fletcher argued. “You’re not my dad—I don’t care what Griff says—Uncle Bob is my dad—and I’m not staying here, because I hate you!”

      This was a scared kid talking, Boone reflected, but the words hurt just the same, like a hard punch to the gut.

      “I can see why you’d feel that way,” he answered calmly, reasonably, catching a glimpse of Griffin out of the corner of his eye. The boy huddled in the bathroom doorway, looking on worriedly, so small in his jeans and striped T-shirt, with his shoulders hunched slightly forward, putting Boone in mind of a fledgling bird not quite trusting its wings. “But we’re going to have to make the best of things, you and Griff and me.”

      Fletcher glared rebelliously at Boone and slowly shook his head from side to side.

      “Dad?” Griff interceded softly. “I can help Fletcher with his bath, get him ready for bed and everything, if you want me to.”

      Boone sighed as he rose to his full height. “Maybe that would be a good idea,” he said, shoving a hand through his hair, which was probably creased from wearing the baseball cap all day. He was still in the clothes he’d put on to go fishing early that morning, too, and he felt sweaty and tired and sad.

      “He’s got pajamas in the suitcase,” Griffin said helpfully. “You could get them out—they’re the ones with the cartoon train on the front....”

      Boone smiled down at his older son and executed an affable if lazy salute. “Check,” he said, starting down the short hallway to follow through on the errand assigned. As he walked away, he could hear Griff talking quietly to his little brother, telling him he’d like living here, if he’d just give it a chance.

      Griffin was clearly having none of it.

      Boone went outside, retrieved the suitcases and brought them in, opening the smaller one after setting both bags on the built-in bed that took up most of the nook of a bedroom reserved for the boys. Back in Missoula, they shared a room four times that size, with twin beds and comforters that matched the curtains and even a modest flat-screen TV on the wall.

      He sighed again, bent over the suitcase and rooted through for the pajamas Griff had described. He found them, plus a couple toothbrushes in plastic cases, each one labeled with a name.

      He took the lot back to the bathroom and rapped lightly on the now-closed door. “Pajama delivery,” he said, in the jocular tone of a room-service person.

      There was some splashing in the background, and Griff opened the bathroom door far enough to reach for the things Boone was holding, grinning sympathetically.

      “Thanks, Dad,” Griff said in a hushed voice.

      Boone nodded in acknowledgment, turned away and wandered back into the kitchen, where he picked up the receiver from the wall phone and called Molly and Bob’s home number.

      Molly answered right away. “Boone?” she said.

      “Yep,” Boone replied. “We got home just fine.”

      “Good,” Molly responded. “How are they doing? Griffin and Fletcher, I mean?”

      “As well as can be expected, I guess,” Boone said, as another wave of weariness swept over him. “How’s Bob?”

      “He’s probably asleep by now,” Molly answered. “He goes into surgery at six tomorrow morning.” She paused, though not long enough for Boone to wedge in a reply. “Are they in bed already? Griffin and Fletcher, I mean? Did they brush their teeth? Say their prayers?”

      “Fletch is in the tub, mother hen,” Boone told his frazzled sister, with a smile in his voice. “We’ll get around to the rest of it later.”

      Molly gasped, instantly horrified. “Fletcher is in the tub by himself?”

      Boone frowned as it came home to him, yet again, how much he didn’t know about bringing up kids. “Griff is with him,” he said.

      “Oh,” said Molly, clearly relieved.

      “So things are pretty much okay on your end?” Boone asked. He was out of practice as a father, and every part of him ached, from the heart out. Bob was in for some serious pain and a long, rigorous recovery, and Molly, Ted, Jessica and Cate had no choice but to go along for the ride.

      “We’re doing all right,” she said. “Not great, but all right.”

      “You’ll let me know if there’s anything you need?”

      “You know I will,” Molly answered. She paused a beat before going on. “Can we stay in touch by text and email for a while? I’m not sure I’m going to have enough energy for the telephone right at first, and I’m afraid every time I hear the boys’ voices, I’ll burst into tears and scare the heck out of them. I already miss them so much.”

      Boone’s reply came out sounding hoarse. “Do whatever works best for you,” he said. “I’ll look after the boys, Molly. I’ll figure all this fathering stuff out. In the meantime, try to stop worrying about us, okay? Take care of yourself, or you’ll be no good to Bob and the kids. In other words, get some rest.”

      “I’ll try,” she said, and he knew she was smiling, although she was probably dead on her feet after the day she’d put in. “You’re a good brother, Boone. And I love you.”

      “Flattery will get you everywhere,” Boone answered. “And I love you, too. I’ll text or email tomorrow.”