I paused with the level against my shoulder. “I'm sorry.”
“Don't be. I'm glad we made it through them. But you know what got us through? Not pretending the other person's hurt didn't count. Once either of us started doing that, the house became a lonely place even when we were both inside it.”
I didn't tell her what had happened. I didn't have to. I stood in her doorway until the words settled somewhere I could keep them, then returned to work.
At the office that afternoon Ryan asked again whether Natalie had called. When I said yes, he seemed to relax. He was wearing a charcoal polo with our company logo and carrying a folder of estimates from a developer who wanted to buy three of our upcoming renovation contracts. We'd been discussing the opportunity for weeks. The prospective investor, Westbridge Living, was offering enough money to make our company comfortable for the first time in years, but I worried the terms would force us to cut costs and abandon the kind of careful work we were known for.
“Have you looked at the revised Westbridge numbers?” Ryan asked.
“Not yet.”
“We need to move. They won't keep that offer open forever.”
“We can't sign anything before Luis reviews what the schedule would look like.”
Ryan rubbed his forehead. “Daniel, at some point you have to stop acting like every decision is a moral referendum.”
“It's my name on the work. And yours.”
“Exactly. I'd like both those names to be worth something.”
He softened a moment later and asked if I wanted to get a drink that evening. I declined. The idea of sitting in a crowded bar talking about my wife's absence to the person who had watched us marry felt impossible. Ryan shrugged and said I should call if I changed my mind. He also suggested I send Natalie something reassuring before she convinced herself I'd stopped caring. I said I didn't intend to contact her while she was away. His smile was polite, but I thought I saw impatience behind it.
Later that night, I noticed a photograph on social media from a restaurant in Cincinnati. A former colleague of Natalie's had posted a group picture that included a woman with dark hair and a familiar green jacket, partially obscured near the back. I enlarged it before I could stop myself. The woman's face was turned away, and there was no way to be certain it was Natalie. I spent ten minutes staring anyway. The realization embarrassed me so much that I closed the app and moved my phone to the other side of the room.
Tuesday brought rain and a conversation I'd avoided for years. I went to see my father, Walter, at his small house in Delaware, Ohio. He had regained most of his speech after his stroke, but he tired easily and moved with a carefulness that made every ordinary action look deliberate. My mother had been gone for a decade. Dad lived among the clocks, books, and wooden furniture they'd collected, refusing to leave the place where they had raised us. He could always tell when I was hiding something, partly because he'd taught me all my worst habits.
We sat on his porch while rain tapped against the railing. At first we talked about work, the price of lumber, and whether his neighbor's fence could survive another winter. Finally he put down his coffee and said, “You and Natalie all right?”
I hadn't told him. Maya hadn't, either. “Why do you ask?”