Another sunny day. There were already bright umbrellas pitched across the beach below her. She never went to the beach, something left over from her system days, she guessed. They never walked to the beach in those days. She didn’t know why. Maybe because it cost money to get on the beach, money they didn’t usually have or if they did, it was spent on something else. She couldn’t remember what. She didn’t do drugs. She knew what drugs did. She’d grown up with them all around her. Until she went to live with Aunty. Those had been the happiest few years of her life. Just a shotgun shack on the wrong side of town, but it had been home. She stepped away from the window. What the hell was she doing thinking about those days? Any of the days before she came to live with the Cartwrights. It must be because of the funeral, because of the box sitting in the bottom of the coat closet, waiting to be opened or tossed out still taped shut. It was her day off. She could deal with the box. It was as good a time as any.
