Lester dreamed that he was having breakfast with Bonnie. She had whipped up a whole stack of buttermilk pancakes with fresh blueberries, a pile of bacon, and homemade hash browns. The house smelled like a taste of heaven. The kitchen looked different but kinda the same. The table and chairs were the same—made of hickory wood from a shop down in Dushore. Same stove and refrigerator. The same cookie jar perched on the edge of the counter that he visited a few times a day. But there were no pictures or calendars of cats. No cat figurines. No cat magnets on the fridge. No four-legged critters winding between his legs, purring and screeching out their high-pitched meow. Not a single cat in the whole goddamned house.

Lester knew he must be dreaming.

Bonnie poured him a fresh cup of coffee and smiled down at him. She looked the same but was prettier than ever. Younger, too. She looked like she did when Lester still had a full head of hair.

Bonnie put two more breakfast plates down. She filled two juice glasses with fresh-squeezed OJ—nice and pulpy the way he liked it—and glanced toward the back door. She opened her mouth and called out, but no sound came from her mouth. Her lips moved, and she was definitely saying something, except Lester couldn’t hear anything but the sound of a strong-blowing wind. He hadn’t noticed the steady howl of wind till now.

Bonnie smiled as the back door swung open, and the kitchen was immediately bathed with bright, intense sunlight. Lester had to shield his eyes from the blinding light and he squinted at two silhouettes of small children framed in the doorway. As the children ran toward him and leaped onto his lap, the wind picked up and stung at his face. Then Lester woke up.

His eyes fluttered open. The wind was snapping at his face and neck. His back and head felt cold. Above him the sky was a checkerboard of black and white cumulus clouds. He still remembered learning that word, “cumulus,” back in the tenth grade. Always stuck with him. His tenth-grade science teacher, Mr. Salsman, would be proud.

A major storm front was moving in. Lester stared up at the sky and watched the clouds fold into one another and move along at a snail’s pace as the remnants of his dream still tickled at his brain. He noticed the snow-covered tree limbs that hung above and knew that he wasn’t dreaming anymore, and he sure wasn’t at home.

“Hell.” He rested his head back on the ground again. He stayed there and didn’t panic—wasn’t exactly the panicking type. He needed to figure out how bad his condition was. If he got himself all worked up, it would just make matters that much worse.

He tried to lift both arms toward the sky. The right side moved up just as his brain had ordered, but the left side went up a little ways, a few inches off the ground, and that was about the extent of it.

He smacked and licked at his lips to get the feel of them. “All right, Lester, just what are you gonna do now?” It felt mighty strange to talk to himself, especially out loud, but his voice sounded clear and he didn’t slur any. That was a good sign at least.

Once again he tried to sit up. He hadn’t attempted a sit-up since he was growing the short and curly ones down below his belt buckle in the seventh grade. He managed to get his right hand under him and push himself to a sitting position after a few attempts. It was a long struggle that took well over a minute or two, but he managed. He sat in the snow and tried to catch his breath.

The forest stood quiet around him. The call of the coonhounds was gone. The wind blew steadily, causing creaks and groans from the trees. Dead brown leaves that stubbornly hung on to branches flapped and rattled like tiny dancers above him. Large snowflakes floated down, ending their long journey from the storm clouds. It was peaceful. So damn peaceful.

Lester pretty much accepted what he got and didn’t complain. He loved his wife and liked his job. His friends who were still living treated him well and were there for him if he needed to bend their ear. He had done good with his life.

He found himself getting a little misty and shook away all the sappy thoughts. “Hell, old man, you ain’t in the grave just yet.” He reached down into the snow and grabbed hold of a fallen branch and set it in the ground beside him. He readied himself and pushed up. His knees popped and his lower back ached, but he managed to right himself.

He waited a bit before trying to walk. While his body played catch-up with his brain, he looked around to get his bearings. Footprints trailed off to the left of him—the direction he’d come from. He looked at the sky again and figured he hadn’t been out for very long. Maybe twenty minutes or so, but darkness wasn’t far off.

He put his right foot forward, but his left wasn’t so accommodating. He dug his makeshift cane deeper into the frozen ground and pushed himself ahead, dragging his left foot and leg behind him like a gimp.

Clean-shaven. That boy doesn’t wear a beard. Never has. Mindy’s face was all scuffed up by a man’s facial hair. Those marks weren’t from the carpet. Hell.

Then he got to thinking about Mike’s face and neck when he first saw him out at Mindy’s trailer. The deputy said he got into a scuffle at some party in Towanda.

Lester pushed himself to limp faster, but his weary bones would only move so fast. Hell, old man.