The Meadow 137 I had a routine. Every ten minutes, I would stop what I was doing and spend ten seconds at the front window, and then run to mine, which had the best view of the backyard and pasture and barn. Well, the second-best view if you counted the kitchen window, but I couldn’t keep getting more water, Mom would get curious. And I was going to the bathroom a lot. Dad raised his eyebrows each time I got up, but he didn’t question anything; he drank coffee, splayed out on his armchair, watching the news. At one point, I saw Mary’s parents walk down the street with a plastic bag. They would walk along the side of the road, keeping their eyes in the ditch that ran along, parallel to the sidewalk. Then they would linger in front of our house on the street, the bag filling and emptying with the breeze. Their slippers were dirty, and their bathrobes trailed behind them, scraping up leaves and pine needles. Dusk fell, and nothing happened. I felt anxious; I knew they would get us back. I feared for our house, our yard, my Mom and Dad and Adam, who kept to his bedroom all day, only leaving for food, and our chickens—I pictured them huddled underneath that piece of curved plywood, flexing their feet. I constantly stood on my bed, pressing my nose to the window, squinting to see the barn and corral, seeking any movement. Adam kept the chickens inside, which only made me more nervous: If he was scared, I didn’t know what to be. But when we walked in the pasture, my feet filling his footprints, there was nothing out of the ordinary. The barn smelled correct. Oscar and Rooney and the hens were all there, strutting, feeling even more at ease with the lack of Mary’s motorcycle. But I couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong. When we closed door, saying goodnight, Adam walked to the barbed wire fence. Mary was on the track again, in jeans and a blue hoodie, following the path she would take if she were on her bike, her hands on a pretend handlebar, twisting
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