Dean didn't ask, "What stuff?" but instead climbed the stairs to the smaller of the two bedrooms, and in less than ten minutes was asleep. White days and Philadelphia had that effect.
Much later, sometime in the deep hours of the night, he awoke to the sound of thunder and the rush of wind. The lights downstairs were off, so Fred too had retired. Dean began to float back to sleep, half content in the thought that the storm might wash out the steamy, unseasonable humidity. Thunder had never bothered him, even as a child. He and his mother would sit out on their porch in the most frenzied storm, watching the wild and wonderful display. But he realized not everyone felt the same way. His mind pictured Cynthia Byrne, perhaps awake and alone with her grief, listening to Mother Nature's fury.