“It’s fine.”
“That’s not an answer.”
He looked at her. She was looking into her mug, but her voice had that same directness he had already noticed in her. Calm, not pushy, but real.
“No,” he admitted. “I didn’t.”
“Why didn’t you go back to Mrs. Parker’s?”
Alex was quiet for a second.
“Didn’t want to leave.”
Kate nodded, simply accepted the answer, didn’t pry it open. That was another thing about her. She knew when not to push. He appreciated it more than he expected.
Lily woke around nine. She came onto the porch rumpled, rabbit under one arm, wearing pajamas with bears on them. She stopped, saw Alex, and wasn’t surprised in the least.
“You’re still here,” she observed.
“Still here.”
“Good.” She walked over to her mother and climbed into her lap. “Mom, I’m hungry.”
“That’s a good sign,” Alex said.
Kate smiled—really smiled—for the first time in days. Not politely, not cautiously. Just out of relief. The smile changed her face, made her look younger, and Alex caught himself looking at her a second longer than necessary. He stood up, picked up the empty mugs, and went into the kitchen. He needed something to do.
They fed Lily oatmeal with jam. She ate eagerly, which settled the matter: the worst had passed. Alex sat across from her drinking a second cup of coffee. Lily chewed and studied him thoughtfully.
“Mr. Alex,” she said. “Are you going to live here?”
“No, Lily. I live in D.C.”
“We’re going back to D.C. soon too.”
Kate tensed slightly. Alex noticed by the way she set down her mug.
“I don’t know that yet,” she answered her daughter evenly.
“Mrs. Parker says D.C. has too many people and everybody’s in a rush.”
“That’s accurate,” Alex said.
“Nobody rushes here,” Lily said. “I like it here. But I want preschool.”
“There isn’t one here. The nearest is in the county seat,” Kate said. “Too far.”
Lily sighed with the air of someone making peace with the unfairness of the world and returned to her oatmeal.
After breakfast Kate stayed on the porch with her daughter. Lily demanded to draw, and the two of them settled in with a pad and crayons. Alex went into the main bedroom. He wanted to take another look at the drafty window and see whether he could seal it himself or whether it needed a professional. He worked on the frame for twenty minutes or so. Found some old weather stripping in the shed. Managed a rough repair. Not perfect, but it would stop the draft. Then he straightened up, brushed off his hands, and looked around.
His mother’s room. He had been in it several times over the last few days, but now, for the first time, he was really looking. Not as an inspector with a notebook. Not in the dark with a flashlight beside a sick child. Just looking.
The bed with the patchwork quilt. The china cabinet. The round table. The chair by the window. His mother always sat in that chair when she read. On the table was a stack of notebooks, a cup full of pencils. Everything as it had been. Kate hadn’t moved anything. She had lived carefully among another person’s belongings, trying not to take up more space than necessary.
Alex walked to the window. Outside was the yard, the apple tree, the field beyond. He looked at that view and realized his mother had looked at it every morning. For years. Alone. He tugged the curtain aside to check whether this window leaked too.
And something fell onto the sill. He looked down. An envelope. It had slipped behind the curtain at some point and apparently been there a long time, because a thin layer of dust lay on it. Plain white envelope, unsealed. Alex picked it up and turned it over. On the front, in his mother’s handwriting, in large clear letters, was one word: “Alex.”
He stood there holding the envelope. Then he walked out into the hall.
“Kate.”
She came in quickly from the porch. Probably heard something in his voice. He held out the envelope.
“I found this behind the curtain. You didn’t put it there, did you?”
