"Jim? You awake?"
"Hi, Mom."
A door opened and now shut. He felt her weight on the bed.
"Why, Jim, your hands are ice. You shouldn't have the window so high. Mind your health."
"Sure."
"Don't say 'sure' that way. You don't know until you've had three children and lost all but one."
"Never going to have any," said Jim.
"You just say that."
"I know it. I know everything."
She waited a moment. "What do you know?"
"No use making more people. People die."
His voice was very calm and quiet and almost sad.
"That's everything."
"Almost everything. You're here, Jim. If you weren't, I'd given up long ago."
"Mom." A long silence. "Can you remember Dad's face? Do I look like him?"
"The day you go away is the day he leaves forever."
"Who's going away?"
"Why, just lying there, Jim, you run so fast. I never saw anyone move so much, just sleeping. Promise me, Jim. Wherever you go and come back, bring lots of kids. Let them run wild. Let me spoil them, some day."
"I'm never going to own anything can hurt me."
"You going to collect rocks, Jim? No, some day, you've got to be hurt."
"No, I don't.
He looked at her. Her face had been hit a long time ago. The bruises had never gone from around her eyes.
"You'll live and get hurt," she said, in the dark. "But when it's time, tell me. Say goodbye. Otherwise, I might not let you go. Wouldn't that be terrible, to just grab ahold?"
She rose up suddenly and went to put the window down.
"Why do boys want their windows open wide?"
"Warm blood."
"Warm blood." She stood alone. "That's the story of all our sorrows. And don't ask why."
The door shut.
Jim, alone, raised the window, and leaned into the absolutely clear night.
Storm, he thought, you there?