Crooked Hallelujah. Kelli Jo Ford

      When Justine catches her trying to light a roach left in an ashtray, that’s it. She ties her hair up in a bun and spends an entire Sunday cleaning house. Then she gets on the phone. The next weekend Pitch makes the drive across the Red River and into Oklahoma even though he didn’t have a race. Reney crouches at the top of the stairs listening to the two of them talk deep into the night. Pitch stays for three weeks before Reney suspects that the good-time crew might be gone for good.

      They take her to Padlock Pizza to tell her they are getting married. The three of them are moving to Texas, and she’ll get a horse. Reney’s eyes well with tears. Though she is no farther from Granny than she had been a minute before, she thinks her heart might burst from the way she suddenly misses Granny, dear Granny who speaks Cherokee best and wraps her up in arms that smell like Shower to Shower and something good cooked over the stove. A single gray braid curling to the middle of her back, she crushes Reney’s bones the good way, like only love can.