Same lake. Loon Lake, three hours north, up where the pine trees get so thick the roads turn dark at noon.
Same cheap motel by the water. Same bad cell service. Same three days, Friday to Sunday, the second weekend of August.
Nothing unusual. Ever.
He’d come home every year sunburned and smelling like bug spray and lake water, with a cooler full of fish nobody wanted to clean and a dozen stories about Ray falling out of the boat.
He’d kiss me at the door. He’d tell me he missed me. He’d hand me a jar of wild blueberry jam from the little farm stand at the edge of town, because I’d said once, nine years ago, that I liked it, and he never forgot.
This year, there was no jam.
He’d come in the door Sunday night at seven-thirty. He’d hugged me fast. A quick one-armed hug, his face turned to the side. Then he’d carried his duffel bag straight upstairs without stopping.
