They talked for another minute. About the Twins’ spring training. About his truck, which needed new brakes. About whether she’d heard back from South Dakota State.

Then he said he had to go, he was pulling into the gas station, love you, kiddo.

“Love you too, Dad.”

She hung up. She sat there for a second looking at her phone.

Then she got up. She rinsed her bowl in the sink. Most of the chili went down the drain. She set the bowl in the drying rack.

Then she went upstairs.

I sat at the kitchen table by myself.

I wanted to go up after her. I didn’t. I know my daughter. When she goes upstairs like that, quiet, she doesn’t want company. She wants to lie on her bed with her earbuds in and stare at the ceiling until whatever it is stops hurting.

I knew it was going to hurt. I knew the second he said kiddo in that voice.

I cleaned up the kitchen. I put the chili in a Tupperware. I wiped down the counters twice.

Then I sat down at the table with my laptop and looked at the balance in my checking account.

Four hundred and twelve dollars.

Rent was due Friday.

Chapter Two: 9:40 P.M.

At 9:40 that night, his wife Tasha posted a picture.

I saw it because I was in bed scrolling on my phone, the way you do when you can’t sleep. Tasha and I aren’t friends. But we’re friends on Facebook, the way people in small towns are. You click accept and then you forget about it.

The picture came up at the top of my feed.

Her daughter, Madison, also seventeen, in a six-hundred-dollar gown from Sioux Falls.

A long, fitted dress, champagne gold, with sequins all over it that caught the light. A slit up one side. Thin straps. Madison was standing in front of a three-way mirror in a bridal shop, with her blonde hair down, smiling over her shoulder at the camera.

Tasha’s caption said: Found THE dress! Madison’s going to be the prettiest girl at Mitchell prom. Thank you Boutique 605!

I knew what it cost. Boutique 605 is the fancy dress store in Sioux Falls, on Phillips Avenue downtown. Everybody in eastern South Dakota knows it. Their prom dresses start at four hundred dollars.