Still, the boy kept knocking.
He could not have been more than three.
His brown hair stuck up at the back, his cheeks were flushed, and his face was wet from tears that had run silently down both sides of his mouth.
One hand clutched a crumpled receipt to his chest like it was the only thing in the world he was allowed to lose.
Duke rolled the bike to the curb and killed the engine.
The sudden quiet made the whole street feel too empty.
Bellwater was the kind of town that went still after sunset, especially on a weeknight.
The laundromat lights glowed at the far end of Main Street.
The hardware store shades had already been pulled.
A dog crossed the road with no hurry, as if nothing in the world was wrong.
But something was wrong.
Duke felt it before he knew it.
He had spent the day under the hood of Earl Picket’s old Ford, fixing a problem Earl could not afford to pay for.