As angry as I had been at my father, it was nothing compared to how I felt when she delivered that news. How could he let this happen? A nursing home! She was only forty-four. What if I had never left? Could I have prevented this? Again, I had questions for which there were no answers. She told me it was for the best, that I shouldn’t worry, that I should study hard, that everything would be okay. So I studied hard and ran harder. Dusty noticed. I was tearing up ground. I was assaulting hills and attacking animal trails, the more weed-choked the better.
