It felt easier to sidle into the real question this way. True, Michael wasn't someone who made him feel overly suspicious--or someone who seemed likely to have bad intentions in asking for more information.

It still felt easier to slide into talking (even just thinking) about the home of being here and the home he'd known before it.

He ducked to lift another stone from the pebbles of the shore. "When my grandmother passed away, they took the house. It-- was time to start somewhere."