She looked toward the window.
“Because by the time I finished writing it, you came home late from work, ate dinner standing at the counter, and told me you were too tired to talk.”
I closed my eyes.
“And the next day?” I asked quietly.
“The next day you said maybe we should get divorced.”
I sank into the chair.
The timing was unbearable.
A letter.
There had been a letter.
Maybe the truth had been sitting ina drawer while I rehearsed my escape.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“I know.”
“Will you let me read it?”
She didn’t answer for a long time.
Then she said, “Not yet.”
I nodded, though disappointment pressed hard against my ribs.
“Okay.”
She looked at me then, almost confused.
“You’re not going to argue?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s yours.”
For a moment, her face seemed to tremble around an emotion she wouldn’t name.
Then she reached for the mystery novel on her bedside table.
“Chapter twelve,” she said quietly.
So I read.
The surgery was scheduled for the following Tuesday.
In the days leading up to it, Sophie grew quieter. Not distant exactly, but inward. She listened to doctors, signed forms, and accepted visitors with a kind of composed politeness that worried me more than tears would have.
The night before surgery, a storm moved over Chicago.
Rain streaked the hospitalwindows, turning the city lights into long, trembling lines.
Linda had gone back to Sophie’s apartment to shower and sleep for a few hours. I stayed, sitting beside the bed while Sophie picked at a cup of gelatin she clearly didn’t want.
“You can stop pretending that tastes good,” I said.
She glanced at me. “I’m trying to be optimistic.”
“That dessert has no relationship with optimism.”
“It’s cherry.”
“It’s red.”
She laughed softly.
Then silence returned.
After a while, she set the cup aside.
“Ethan?”
“Yeah?”
“Are you doing this because you feel responsible?”
The question was inevitable.
I had been waiting for it.
“No,” I said.
She studied me carefully.
