“There was writing on the cab. Big red letters. I don’t remember it well. We were…” She stopped. “I remember he was older. Had a mustache. He gave Sophie a chocolate bar.”
“That’s something,” Andrew said. “We’ll try to find him. Also, the child’s residence matters. If they’re legally registered here, that helps establish this as the child’s primary home.”
Mike said:
“Then I’ll do that. Already decided.”
The lawyer nodded.
“Then we start. First step is filing for divorce. At the same time, we file for custody and primary residence. We’ll decide which court gives us the better position.”
“Here,” Mike said.
Sarah looked at him.
“Here,” she said too.
On the drive home they were quiet. Not heavily. Just each thinking. Near the edge of town Sarah said:
“Do you understand what you’re doing?”
“Yes,” Mike said.
“This isn’t pity?”
He was quiet a moment, eyes on the road.
“No,” he said. “It isn’t.”
She didn’t ask him to explain. She turned to the window. Out beyond the glass the fields slid by. The snow had settled, and in places dark earth showed through, alive and ready for spring.
When they got home, Rusty was waiting by the gate. Tail wagging, hopping in place. Sophie, whom they’d picked up from Ellen’s on the way, ran to him with a happy yell. Rusty flopped over and offered his belly.
Everything was almost normal. Almost. Because somewhere back in town papers were being filed and a court date would come, and that wasn’t terrifying exactly, but it was serious. Mike knew that. Sarah did too.
That night Mike didn’t sleep. Not from fear. He just lay there thinking. Thinking about how it had all happened. For a year and a half he’d lived there alone, and his life had been empty. Not dramatic. Not tragic every single day. Just empty. Like an empty house. Walls standing, roof intact, and nothing inside.
Then somebody knocked. He got up and went to the kitchen. Sarah was sitting at the table with a mug. She wasn’t sleeping either. She saw him and didn’t seem surprised. She stood, put the kettle on, and he sat down. She poured him tea and sat across from him again.
“I’ve been thinking,” he said. “I don’t think Laura would’ve wanted me living like that.”
Sarah knew who he meant. She didn’t ask.
“I think she would’ve wanted you to be happy,” Sarah said quietly.
“You helped me remember what living feels like. Really living.”
They sat in silence.
“I don’t know how to say this right,” he said. “Been a long time since I’ve said much of anything.”
“You’re doing fine,” Sarah answered.
He laid his hand on the table, just there, near hers. She looked at his hand. Then she placed hers over it. They sat like that in the quiet while the kettle cooled on the stove and outside it was a spring night now, not a January one, different somehow, carrying the smell of snowmelt and thawing ground. Nothing else needed saying. The important part had already been said.
A few days later Sophie found Mike eating breakfast alone. She came into the kitchen in pajamas, with Daisy tucked under one arm and her hair sticking up from sleep. She stood beside him, looked at him seriously, then said:
