After returning to Monta Clare, Saint pulls Patch out of one old house and into another. There, Patch spends time on the porch with Saint's grandmother, Norma, listening to her play harmonica and smoke while the two of them laugh together. Saint eventually comes outside and sharply scolds them for making noise because a neighbor's new baby is sleeping.

During his first month back, Patch feels mostly numb, but Saint and Sammy keep his life from collapsing into silence. At times he listens to Saint play the piano, and those moments are among the only times he feels anything. As winter lingers and the town nears a record snowfall, Patch settles into the slow routine of parole.

Because parole requires him to hold a job, Patch spends time sitting in the gallery, echoing an earlier period of his life. Visitors come in, study his paintings, and sometimes ask to buy them, but Patch deflects them by sending them to another gallery farther south. Sammy jokes that every lost sale is adding to Patch's debt, and Patch dryly asks for the total.

As spring begins to break through, Patch stops at Green's Convenience Store to pick up coffee for Sammy. He notices a small blonde girl stealing a candy bar, warns her she will get caught, and then quietly shows her a better way to hide it. The encounter hits Patch with a sudden, painful memory. A moment later, after noticing flowers pushing through cracked concrete, Patch looks through the dressmaker's window and sees Misty Meyer standing beside her mother. When Misty turns, Patch is stunned by the sight of her smile.