I grabbed Wyatt’s laptop charger and a few shirts. On my way out, I passed Ezra’s bedroom. The door was half open.
On his nightstand sat a blood-pressure cuff. Beside it, a plastic pill organizer, the kind my mother used, with every day of the week labeled. In the trash can by the door was a white paper bag from the St. Brigid’s Hospital pharmacy.
I stood there for a second, frowning.
Then I told myself it wasn’t my business. Dale was sick. Maybe Ezra was picking up his father’s prescriptions. Maybe Renata had asked him to. There were a dozen explanations, and I was too angry at that family to want any of them.
I locked the door, put the key back under the mat, and drove home.
Later, I would think about that pill organizer a lot.
Back home, I sat at the kitchen table and replayed every conversation I’d had with Dale and Renata in the last six months. The canceled barbecue in May. Renata saying she was “just tired.” Dale selling his boat in April and joking that he needed the money for “medical stuff.” I had laughed. I hadn’t asked.
