Ava slipped the envelope into the mailbox at two-forty, tentatively raising the flag as Wyatt and Reid ran interference—Wyatt asking his father to watch in the backyard and tell him if he was doing his baseball drills right.

It was three-fifteen now. The postal carrier never came before three-thirty so Bonnie had time to fetch it. If she wanted to.

Tramp Bar meant everything to Rick. For as long as Bonnie had been working for the Glassers, he'd been telling her—telling people like Chad Jortlesburg—about the long-range plan. He thought the idea "had franchise written all over it." He saw the distillery piece being a major differentiator. Having majored in economics at Franklin City College, he felt confident of the financial underpinnings.

But intercepting Wyatt's letter would be meddling.

Though Bonnie's cleaning schedule had long ago pushed out Sunday church, she still considered herself a God-fearing Presbyterian and believed He generally lined up the bowling pins straight. If the Glassers didn't have enough control over their kids to prevent such a thing, what chance did they have of running Tramp Bar—and buying the lake house, and throwing constant parties for which they bought every drop of booze themselves?

Maybe the bank's denying their loan was, in fact, the best outcome. Better than bankruptcy in your early forties.

Deciding to leave the letter in the mailbox—but allowing that her mind could change—Bonnie returned to work.

The extended party-clean covered several areas of the house Bonnie didn't otherwise touch. She swept Cheez-Its from the pool deck, streamlined the coat closet, and dealt with clutter in the laundry room.

On the clutter, Val had instructed, "Shove it all behind the dryer. You never know who'll pair up and go looking for a lockable nook."

Next Bonnie dragged the vacuum cleaner to the basement, where she used the hardwood floors setting on the low-pile carpet, sucking up more Skittles than dirt. Children at the party would be strongly encouraged to entertain themselves here, either with a movie or Hivefite—that video game they all played.

Tidying up took longer than expected. Ava must've had a blowout doll session—their clothes and furniture were spread like shrapnel from one wall to the other. Finally Bonnie had sorted the last Barbie shoe into its correct bin and bumped her vacuum upstairs.

She decided to take the vacuum back out to the truck. The basement air quality was poor—Bonnie suspected the same cat responsible for that spot in Wyatt's room—and she was eager to get outside.

From the porch, she noted the mail flag was still up.

Bonnie heaved the vacuum into the passenger side of her truck's cab. She was replacing a brush attachment that'd fallen from its notched slot when she heard a car engine. Moments later, Val zoomed up the drive.

Bonnie pulled the door closed at the last moment.

"Hell, Bonnie—I about drilled you!" Val charged from her car, one hand on her forehead and coffee in the other. "I continue to hate this narrow driveway."

Bonnie made sure of the vacuum's attachment, then smiled. No problem.

"Left my Prilosec samples in the garage," Val explained. "How's Rick? Still buying the cover story about the spruce-up?"

"Seems so," Bonnie said. "I think you're in the clear."

"Good good good." Val passed her tongue over her top teeth, frenetic, thinking. "Where is he? What's he up to?"

Bonnie recalled the beer stein and Oregon hops. "He might've taken a phone call for Tramp Bar."

"Right, he's been on edge. Wants that epic launch."

Bonnie joined her hands and tipped her head, a gesture she'd settled into over the years to demonstrate her attention.

Val continued, "His father, ass that the man is, keeps getting in his ear to go bigger. Now he's talking about moving up the distillery piece, which we'd both agreed would be phase three at the earliest."

Bonnie said, "He mentioned a fifty-gallon vat."

"Psh-yeah, the vat! I'd forgotten that insane vat. It'll be the death of us."

Val clickered open the garage door and motioned for Bonnie to walk with her as she looked for the drug samples.

"I just want him to be satisfied. Right? It's such"—she swore—"that he can't be happy with what he is: a fricking amazing parent and partner who makes everybody around him feel good. You know he's coaching lacrosse now? On top of everything else?"

"So I heard."

"He never says no. The word's missing from his vocabulary. And it's absolutely a gender thing—he's not the breadwinner so no matter what he does, it's not enough. He thinks he's a failure. It just...makes me..."

She swore more.

Listening, Bonnie felt deflated herself. She took a step short near the recessed garage drain, pain flaring up her back.

Bonnie had been a homemaker much of her adult life. She knew the dark moments, those days when the children disappointed or you stood in the middle of the living room and it all felt so small—these board games and coaster stacks you neatened, the furnace appointments you tended.

Her first week working away from home, she would sometimes stop and fill her lungs with foreign air, savoring the newness—whether cut gardenias in a centerpiece or stale cigarettes. It didn't matter. She was out in the world. People were counting on her in a capacity that had nothing to do with her family.

Maybe Rick's living room was larger, maybe he was dealing in vats and hops instead of bleach—but what he sought was the same.

Val had found her samples—glancing right past the trove of empty beer bottles—and now headed back to her car. She tossed purple and yellow boxes to the backseat and checked her mascara in the rear-view mirror.

"So things're on track for the party tomorrow?" she asked through the open window, shifting into reverse.

Bonnie said, "On track."

As Val zipped off toward downtown Franklin, fishtailing out of the cul-de-sac, Bonnie thought again of Wyatt's letter. She harbored the same reservations she'd had an hour ago about meddling, but they felt stiff now—like some high-collared dress you'd store in a box.

Even that word, meddling. When had she turned into her grandmother?

Bonnie started for the mailbox, thinking where to stash the letter, how best to dispose of it. Then stopped.

The flag was down, the mail truck just disappearing up Hodgkiss Street.