Somewhere in his past Devin hid a memory of a woman who was his mother. Blonde and blue-eyed, cotton crisp at times but more often he saw her with the worn look of an ancient train. Its glitter gone in rusty slashes. Its time spent stinking of the people it had carried to somewhere important that became no place soon enough.

He remembered--when he pulled out the memory like a greeting card given as a child--hot milk frothed with chocolate dust and cookies with the letters of his name.

And he remembered the bright red splash on the wall above her body.