But Agnes knew they’d seen snows right after her mother had left, then lived among blooms, then summer-dried grasses, turning leaves, and now the scent of snow was in the air again. It’s what they used to call a year, and that’s how long her mother had been gone. Her mother would never admit that, though. She might claim the weather could not be trusted. Agnes opened her mouth to speak, but her mother’s eyes prompted her to shut it. There was no argument to be had. The emotion of the reunion had already flared when their eyes had locked. If her mother felt bad or was sorry, then Agnes had missed the signal. And now it was a memory.

“And your hair,” her mother said. “What happened to your beautiful hair?” She reached out and smoothed a hand over Agnes’s head.

Agnes ducked out from under her hand.

“Okay, that’s enough.” Her mother snapped her fingers. And Agnes begrudgingly brought her head back for inspection.

“Who cut it?”

Agnes shrugged.

“Well,” her mother said, cupping Agnes’s head, “at least your skull is perfectly round. I did a good job turning you in your crib. You don’t see a skull that lovely and round every day. I guess I was a good mother after all, huh?” She laughed and looked to Val, who flashed a false, sour smile back at her. “Well,” her mother said, “I love your hair short. It’s very you.”

“I’m growing it out,” Agnes mumbled, picking the grime from between her toes and balling it with her fingers.

Agnes’s mother stepped toward her. “Come here,” she commanded, wrapping her arms around her daughter, pulling her from her stone perch slowly so Agnes’s legs unfolded and planted beneath her. Agnes wiped the toe jam onto her mother’s hip as she lightly pressed her hands against her. She was offering an approximation of affection, a studied version of it. It felt like what her mother often offered. Then Agnes slid from her embrace, back onto the stone as though she had always been a part of it. Her arms lay across her knees, her head propped, bored, atop her arms. She watched the fire. She felt dizzy. She willed her mother to move on.

“What are you doing back?” Val said, more accusation than question.

“I was just wondering that myself,” her mother said. “Where is Glen?” But it wasn’t a question for anyone in particular. She knew where Glen was.

Her mother grabbed Agnes’s arm and she tumbled off the stone. Agnes’s legs wobbled underneath her. She’d never felt as unsteady, knocked over.

Her mother headed straight to the caves. It was as natural as if her mother and Glen had planned this meeting long ago. Her mother had a sense for Glen, as though she had sniffed him out. Would her mother still have had a sense for Agnes if she had been the one off in the cave? Agnes thought of her stormy face as she’d looked out among the new and old faces at camp and found Agnes’s. How her mother had spoken not to her but to Val. How stupid her heart had felt. How silly it was to want or feel anything. But she stopped her mind’s progression and rewound, tried to think again of the moment when their eyes had met. And hadn’t there been a momentary calm when the tumult, for both of them, had halted? If I could just stay in that, she thought. It was a thought, a yearning, that helped her gather her balance, get her feet right and under her. A thought that relaxed her arm and shoulder and allowed her to slip her hand into her mother’s as they walked.

*

Glen was facedown on a skin at the mouth of the cave, his arm flung over his head. He looked like a pile of discarded branches. Agnes felt a pang once again. She’d only slept there with him a couple of nights before he insisted she return to the camp. He didn’t want her to become an outcast. She hadn’t gone to see him yesterday. There had been too much to do. But without her, he had no company. Agnes peered at her mother’s face as they approached, trying to register the emotion there. Would she keep Glen company now? Would he want her to? She didn’t remember ever seeing him angry after her mother left. Agnes braced for what that might look like.

Her mother toed Glen’s armpit, and he moved his arm and peered up at her.

“You’re back,” he croaked.

“I’m back,” she said.

“I heard the cheers.”

They both laughed.

Agnes frowned. There had been no cheering. She looked from face to face, her eyes like crickets pinging back and forth. This was not what she had expected.

“Sorry I didn’t get up,” Glen said, rolling over.

“It’s okay,” her mother said.

“I’m weak.”

“I know.”

“You were gone a long time.”

“I know.”

He was quiet. “It’s okay,” he said, and Agnes knew he meant it.

Agnes blinked in surprise. How could he not be angry? Her mother hadn’t even apologized.

Glen sat up a bit against a rock. “I did not think you’d come back, though.”

“I almost didn’t.” She cast her eyes toward Agnes but would not meet her gaze.

“I wish you hadn’t,” Glen said. And Agnes startled at his declaration. And at his tone. He sounded sad.

Glen scooted to the side of the skin, and her mother lay next to him.

“Oh, you poor man,” her mother said. “There’s nothing left.”

Her mother pulled a skin over the two of them and he tried to push it away, but she held tight and he relented. They lay there like that, quietly. They seemed to have forgotten that Agnes was there. She crouched at their feet.

Agnes could see her mother’s eyes, open and alert. They gleamed, catching light as she roamed them over Glen’s skinny and forlorn body. Then she closed them and they lay, as though asleep. They were so peaceful. Agnes had not imagined they could look like this ever again. Her parents together in the hum of near sleep. Agnes’s foot began to bounce. She longed to join them, but felt strangely unwelcome.

She waited a few minutes, then slipped under the pelt, at the feet of her parents. She curled up and found her mother’s ankle and encircled her hand around it. But her mother pulled it away. Agnes took this as proof that she was indeed intruding and prepared to retreat. But then, her mother’s foot returned and slid under Agnes’s side. And Agnes clamped onto her ankle so she could not take it away again.

Glen sighed. “Things have changed.”

“I can see that.”

“No, but it’s more.”

Agnes held her breath for the more. Glen lifted his head slightly, as though to peer down at her. She shut her eyes.

Her mother cleared her throat and shifted subjects. “Aren’t you going to ask me why I left?”

“I know why you left. Your mother died,” he said, his voice quieter.

She did not say anything for a few minutes.

“But when your mother died, you didn’t leave,” she said finally.

“I didn’t like my mother,” he said.

“I didn’t like your mother either,” she said.

They laughed.

“Do you feel better?” Glen asked.

“No.” She sighed. “What are things like here now?”

“Not good. What are things like in the City?”

“Not good.”

They laughed again.

Agnes didn’t think any of this was funny.

“Is Carl in charge?”

“Basically.”

“And everyone is okay with that?” Her mother’s voice was accusatory as it rushed out.

“Well, no. But enough people are. The Newcomers really flocked to him.”

“I see.” She paused. “You should still be in charge,” she said.

“I was never in charge, Bea. We all were.” He sighed, tired now of talking.

“It was never true consensus.”

“Yes, it was.” Glen raised his voice as much as Glen ever raised his voice.

“We discussed. You offered a thought and we agreed with you.”

“That’s not true.”

“It’s true enough. And it worked.”

Glen sighed. “Now Carl and his people make the decisions.”

“Like not feeding you and Agnes. Or the others, as far as I could tell. How did that happen?”

“A couple of Newcomers took over dishing meals.”

“And they give you less food?”

“There’s no evidence of anything like that.”

“But—”

“They’re just taking care of their own first. It’s probably subconscious. They don’t even know they’re doing it. I mean, they’re all very nice. It’s a nice group,” he said, and Bea cackled.

“You and your bright side. There’s no way they don’t know what they’re doing.”

“Well, I guess you’d know.” His voice was sharp. He was exhausted and bewildered, and somewhere underneath all that maybe he was angry. Agnes felt foolish for not seeing it before.

Agnes heard her mother breathe quickly like she was about to spit back some explanation, her whole body tensing to make her point. But she released it all with a long slow exhale.

They were silent again.

Agnes felt her mother shift and lean into Glen. She said quietly, “So, you want me to get rid of them?”

Glen chuckled.

“And by that I mean murder them?”

Glen erupted into laughter that led to choking coughs. Agnes looked at her mother, and she was grinning quietly to herself as she enjoyed Glen’s moment of happiness. Agnes hadn’t heard him laugh this much since before her mother had left. Since before that. Since, she realized, before Madeline.

He regained his breath and squeezed her mother. “I missed you.”

“I missed you too.” Her mother tucked into him more, her foot shifting away from Agnes slightly. Agnes held tight.

“What can I do?” Her mother’s voice sounded small. Like Agnes’s used to. When she lived in the City. When there was so much that was bigger than her. So much beyond her control. When she didn’t realize she had any control.

“Make nice,” he said. “Just make nice.”

Agnes heard them kiss.