The reprieve created by her absence allowed me to examine the sparse contents of the closet with the light shining in from the hallway through the slits in the closet doors. Besides mom’s outfits, there were a couple of jackets I had outgrown, and a few threadbare ones from a thrift store that still fit me. Much of the remaining space was taken up with cardboard boxes, likely containing items that weren’t valuable enough to sell, but not so useless as to be thrown out in the trash. I reached to the back of the closet when my hand enclosed around a narrow, cold, metal tube.