"He'll come tonight," my mother says, sitting and rocking in the old wooden chair. Rotting floorboards creak under her bare leathery feet in a rhythmic crooning. "He'll come tonight," she repeats and laughs softly to the wind. "Come to take us away from here." Empty flowerpots hang from a ceiling mottled with peeling, yellowed paint, rattling lightly in the breeze. I can remember the flowers - bright purple petals mixed with reds and yellows, with green vines to twine around the posts. Flowers which have been dead since before my brother's birth.

My brother Jason, who now rests at her side with his hands loosely curled around a lemonade, and his head tilted back, leaving his throat bared to the elements. His eyes are closed against the sun's glare. I watch them from behind the safety of windows, watch as she absently strokes his hair, her hand pale against the black strands. I know her gaze is fixed on the horizon, at the spot where the sun slips away from her every night, waiting for him to appear. Sometimes I can even follow her thoughts, as they wander ever further from our home, following him back into the sunset.

I can hear the heavy clomp of my father's workboots, climbing up the basement stairs, the creak of hinges as he reaches the top and pushes open the door. He passes behind me, the scent of sawdust and stale beer trailing after him, and I watch his reflection reach into a pocket and draw out a cigarette. He kicks at the flimsy screen door and steps outside. Light flares briefly from between his cupped hands, and he takes a long drag. "Get inside, boy."

Jason slides to his feet and shuffles around my father like a wary stray, body tense and eyes cast down. Father glares at his back, blue eyes hard, then dismisses him with the flick of ash from his cigarette.

"He'll come tonight," my mother says, not quite speaking to my father, still watching the world's edge with eyes lighter than the sky.

He grunts, expelling a stream of smoke, like a dragon's snore from one of mother's stories, and says nothing. There was a time when he tried to reason with her, to sway her mind with words and logic and reason. She answered him with silence and faith. Then he tried to convince her with his fists and his belt and confinement. Father doesn't like to lose.

It was after Father started locking her into their bedroom that she got frantic, worried that he'd come back and she'd miss him. She scratched herself real good on a shard of broken glass, trying to climb out the window, and he had to take her to the hospital. For the next month my brother and I walked to school through a cloud of hushed whispers and sideways glances. Parson even came out to our farm the Sunday after to pray with Father for her recovery. I stayed up real late that night, crouched by the upstairs banister, but I couldn't hear a word they said, just watched the shadows move as Father paced back and forth. Father never raised a hand against her after that, just took to carrying a bottle around the house. Jase soon learned when to make himself scarce.

The creak of the rocking chair slows. "Tonight," Mother whispers.

Inside, my brother takes a last sip of lemonade, then runs water over the glass. There are dirty plates in the sink, coated with dried spaghetti sauce, and he silently starts to clean them as well. Mother's housekeeping is unreliable these days.

Father finishes his cigarette, and stomps back inside. "Kelly," he growls.

I turn away from the window, hands tugging at my gingham dress to straighten it. Don't want him to know I've been playing in the attic. "Yes, Pa?"

"Go and unpack her things."

"You know she'll just pack 'em up again." I feel tired suddenly, but it wouldn't do to tell Father that. Somedays Mother was easier to talk to than he was. He never seemed to hear me when I told him things, didn't really listen to anyone anymore except the Parson. Everyone listened to the Parson.

Father's eyes are on me now, and I try not fidget under his gaze. "'Sides," I smile, "maybe he really will come tonight."

"Don't you start with me now, Kelly. He's not coming back. You know it, I know it, hell, even his damned boy knows it." He jerks his head towards the kitchen, towards Jason, whose name he's never used. "I'm going to be downstairs, finishing up those shelves. See if you can get her to come inside." He looks at her, still rocking oblivious on the porch, and turns away.

I can see Jason concentrating on scrubbing, dragging the sponge over and over the plate. "Jase?"

"S'alright." He brushes angrily at a lock of hair, succeeding only in creating a trail of soapsuds across his forehead. Jason stared at the plate in his hands for a second, than carefully placed it to the side to dry. "If she's got to talk about him, why can't she say something useful? Tell me what he was like, 'stead of just repeating…"

I tear off a paper towel, and try to wipe the suds away. Jason jerks his head back and grabs the sheet from me, and I sigh. "He was only here a month, Jase. I don't know if you can get to know someone in that short a time, but mother was surely convinced that it was love between them."

"But he couldn't have loved her. Or else he would've come back to get us."

"Something else might have come up." I regret the words even as I speak them. Years of preparation and I can't think of something better to say?

"Sure. He could've been kidnapped by aliens or something for the past twelve years." Scowling, Jason tosses the sponge into the sink, splashing water over the counter.

"Don't be silly, there are no aliens. It was the Russians."

"Russia's a democracy now."

"China then."

"What would they want with him?"

"He's probably been tortured for government secrets."

"Good thing he can lie so well."

"Jason."

"I'll see if Mother's up for cooking dinner. Or we can just microwave leftovers."

"Jason-"

"Finish the dishes for me?" Jason doesn't wait for my answer, shifting away to rejoin mother.

"Sure." I stand at the kitchen sink, and gaze out the small window. It's already getting darker, the colors being slowly leeched out of the world and the trees at the edge of our lot blend into each other. I used to sneak out and play pretend among them, hiding from spies and digging up buried treasure and searching for hidden secrets. Until one day I found one. Father really doesn't like to lose.

"Maybe he never left," I whisper, with only the wind to hear.