On Tuesday, the house began to fall apart. It started with the roof. A steady noise. The rhythmic scraping of terracotta, followed by silence and a dull thud. We were in the living room at the time. It must have been a little after six, because we were watching the main stories on the news. Tony was in his chair. I was sprawled on the couch. We didn’t say anything to each other. We just looked up, furrowed our brows and padded outside in our bare feet. The roof tiles were shifting out of place and sliding to the ground, quietly landing on the damp grass. We circled the house with the wheelbarrow. At first, we rushed beneath the tiles to try to catch them. They would land heavily and shatter. The terracotta clashed unbearably against the metal of the wheelbarrow, broken shards flying too close to our faces.

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