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roll, intervention stood as little chance of success as … well, as any intervention in the larger political arena.
    â€œWell, Dad?”
    â€œThe Sudan,” said Steve. “What’s this report about, anyway? Our involvement in Africa?”
    â€œHonesty,” said Tyler. “Anybody who says he would save Sudan is lying. And anybody who doesn’t want to answer is just being politically correct. We asked all the teachers and only Ms. Redfearn in philosophy was honest. And you.” He heard his younger brother come rumbling down the stairs, and called out, “If you had to let someone die, Matt, who would you choose: all of the Sudan, or our parents?”
    â€œSudan,” came the immediate reply. Outside the camera frame, Tyler nodded at the living room and ran his finger over his lips, miming the closing of a zipper. Steve shot a reluctant look at Jocelyn, but he saw from the way she was biting her lip that she was willing to play along. One second later the door opened, and in came Matt with only a towel around his waist, apparently straight from the bathroom.
    â€œAwright, you just got me an extra thousand hits,” Tyler said. Matt pulled a clownish face at the GoPro and wiggled his hips back and forth.
    â€œTyler, he’s thirteen!” Jocelyn said.
    â€œSeriously. That clip with Lawrence, Burak, and me doing a shirtless lip-synch of The Pussycat Dolls got over thirty-five thousand hits.”
    â€œThat was close to porn,” Matt said, pulling up a chair next to him with his back to the living room—and to the woman in Jocelyn’s Limbo. Steve and Tyler exchanged an amused glance.
    â€œCan’t you wear some clothes at the table?” Jocelyn sighed.
    â€œYou wanted me to come down and eat! My clothes smell like horse, and I haven’t even had a shower. By the way, I liked your album, Mom.”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œOn Facebook.” With a mouth full of noodles he pushed himself from the edge of the table and tottered on the hind legs of his chair. “You’re so cool, Mom.”
    â€œI saw it, darling. Four on the floor, okay? Or you’ll fall again.”
    Ignoring her, Matt turned his attention to Tyler’s lens. “I bet you don’t want to know what I think.”
    â€œNo, I do not, brother-who-smells-like-horse. I’d rather you took a shower.”
    â€œIt’s sweat, not horse,” Matt said imperturbably. “I think your question is too easy. I think it’s much more interesting to ask: If you had to let somebody die, who would it be: your own kid or all of Black Spring?”
    Fletcher started up a low growl. Steve looked out into the backyard and saw the dog pressing his head low to the ground behind the wire mesh and baring his teeth like a wild animal.
    â€œJesus, what’s wrong with that dog?” Matt asked. “Apart from being a total nutcake.”
    â€œGramma wouldn’t happen to be around, would she?” Steve asked innocently.
    Jocelyn dropped her shoulders and looked around the room. “I haven’t seen her at all today.” With feigned urgency, she glanced from the backyard to the split red oak at the end of their property, where the path led up the hill: the red oak with the three security cams mounted to the trunk, peering into various corners of Philosopher’s Deep.
    â€œ Gramma wouldn’t happen to be around. ” Matt grinned with his mouth full. “What’ll Tyler’s followers make of that?” Jocelyn’s mother, a long-term Alzheimer’s patient, had died of a lung infection a year and a half before; Steve’s had been dead eight years. Not that YouTube knew, but Matt was having fun.
    Steve turned to his oldest son and said, with a severity that was not at all like him, “Tyler, you’re cutting this out, right?”
    â€œSure, Dad.” He switched voices to TylerFlow95. “Let’s bring the question