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household and as a result, Margaret’s diet was relentlessly healthy and Lola’s had vastly improved. But Lola remained wary of the fry bread and fast foods that flashed enticements at every turn, and was determined that Margaret not succumb. On the other hand, there was nothing to eat in Pal’s house but ravioli. And coffee. Lola inhaled in gratitude. Thankfully, it existed and someone had made a pot.
    â€œThat girl at the convenience store isn’t a day over seventeen,” Pal said. “You’re dreaming, Delbert.”
    Lola started. She hadn’t thought Pal capable of anything approaching humor.
    â€œI’d say she’s the one who’s dreaming. Dreaming of what life could be like with a man who’s done some living.”
    Lola poured herself a cup of coffee and joined the mismatched group at the table that sat in the center of the large kitchen that also functioned as living and laundry rooms. Whatever feminine touches Pal’s mother might have lent to the room had vanished upon her death. A garish green easy chair sat next to a worn brown couch patched with duct tape, facing a TV table absent its television. Jan had said that Delbert had taken care of Pal during the two years after Pal’s parents died, and before she and Delbert’s grandson had enlisted in the military. Lola imagined Delbert and his grandson batching it with Pal during those years, eating meals of canned food in front of the television in companionable silence. The TV, she guessed, had gone to Delbert’s house during Pal’s deployment.
    â€œDelbert thinks he knows a thing or two about women,” Pal said now. “All evidence to the contrary.”
    â€œEvidence to the contrary, my ass. I’ve buried three wives. Wore ’em right out. Now I’m fighting off one who fancies herself as Number Four.”
    â€œDolores Wadda still after you?” Pal said. “Woman needs her head examined.”
    Lola thought she and Margaret must look like a pair of metronomes, their heads swinging back and forth from Delbert to Pal. Margaret almost certainly didn’t understand the conversation, and for that matter, neither did Lola. The body language was all wrong for the banter, Pal staring a hole in the table as she spoke, Delbert peering just as fixedly at Pal, the pain in his eyes contradicting the smile that revealed a third tooth. It was almost as though the two of them were putting on a show for Lola and Margaret.
    Delbert opened the bag, retrieved a doughnut, and pressed it into Pal’s hand. He wiped his fingers, powdered with sugar, against his work pants. Pal held the doughnut without tasting it. She took a sip of the coffee. Red lines threaded the whites of her eyes. One cheek was crimson and flattened, as though she’d slept all night with her face pressed against the table. The sack rustled. “Here.” Delbert withdrew another doughnut and broke it into two uneven pieces and handed one to Lola and one to Margaret, who looked a question to her mother. Lola took a bite. It was stale. She considered a breakfast of ravioli, saw again the seething mass in the trash can, and forced a smile. “Go ahead. It’s fine.”
    Pal nibbled at her own doughnut, barely breaking the surface. Sweat beaded her forehead. Sweating out the alcohol, maybe, Lola thought. The night’s cool still lingered in the kitchen.
    â€œThe Fourth’s coming,” Delbert said. “Everybody’ll be out at the cemetery.”
    Pal ducked her head and rubbed at the scars on her forearm. The scab broke off one of the fresh wounds. Blood threaded its way down her arm. She bent her head and licked it away.
    â€œThe cemetery?” Lola asked. The silence lasted long enough for Lola to wish she hadn’t posed the obvious question.
    â€œDelbert’s grandson—” Pal began.
    â€œMike. Got killed over there last year.”
    The odds would have been against Mike,