The first thing I noticed was the smell.
Rainwater. Old wool. Cigarette smoke that didn’t seem to belong to her. And underneath all of it, the sour, unmistakable scent of someone who hadn’t slept indoors in a very long time.
The second thing I noticed was my husband standing beside her as though bringing a homeless stranger into our home on a Thursday evening was perfectly normal.
“Claire,” Daniel said, “this is Ruth.”
The woman beside him looked somewhere between sixty and seventy. It was hard to tell.
Gray hair hung in knotted ropes around her cheeks. Her oversized men’s coat was soaked from the storm outside, and one sneaker was held together with silver duct tape.
She clutched a grocery bag to her chest.
I stared at Daniel.
Then at her.
Then back at Daniel.
“What is happening?”
Daniel took off his jacket.
