Inoticed it on the walk to Pete’s office.
Eight months in—the street wet, the sky low, my coat collar up against the cold. Colt had texted that morning. One word.Danny.A picture followed a few seconds later—the baby, six weeks old, red-faced, deeply skeptical of the camera. I’d looked at it for a moment, then pocketed my phone and kept walking.
I’d been walking this route every Thursday for months. Somewhere between the corner and the door I realized I wasn’t steeling myself for it anymore. No running through what I was going to say. No bracing. I was just walking.
The work had stopped feeling like effort. That should have been good news. Instead it made me nervous, so I brought it to Pete as soon as I sat down.
“Describe it,” he said.
“I’ve been doing the twice-weekly sessions, the journaling, the group, the monthly visits to Lindsay—all of it—and at the start it felt impossible.” I found the words carefully. “Now it just feels like routine.”
“And that bothers you?”
“It bothers me because I’m afraid it means I’ve stopped feeling it. That I’ve organized my way around the grief instead of through it.”
Pete was quiet for a moment. “Have you had a drink in the past month?”
“No.”
“Have you reached for one?”
“Not really. A couple times out with my brothers I’ve thought about ordering something, but then when I go to order I just get a water. Don’t even think about why.” I shrugged. “It was never really my thing. Before Danny, it was just the odd drink here and there. I don’t miss it.”
“And the journaling—what are you writing about these days?”
I thought about the last few entries. Less raw than the early months, when it had been all Danny, the road, Bea in the doorway. More reflective. What I’d noticed during the week. A conversation with one of the prospects that reminded me of Danny and how I’d handled it differently than I would have a year ago. A morning when I’d woken up and lay there without immediately starting to plan.
“Different things,” I said. “Less about the acute stuff. More about noticing.”
“Like what?”
“Last week I was in the garage with a new prospect, and he made an error on a route calculation. A year ago I’d have corrected him and moved on. Last week I sat down with him and walked through how he’d gotten there—the thinking, not just the answer. And afterward I was surprised that I’d done that.”
“Why?”
“Because Danny used to ask me questions and I’d give him the answer.” I looked at my hands. “I never explained my thinking. I thought efficiency was the point.”
Pete let that sit.
“I’m better at my job,” I said. “That shouldn’t be the main thing I take from months of grief work and therapy, but it’strue.” The thought sat wrong and right at the same time. “Danny would hate that. He’d say I was making everything into something useful.”
“What would you say back?”
“I’d say I can’t help it. And he’d laugh.” I was quiet. “He had a good laugh. I’d forgotten that until recently. All I could hear was the last question. Now I’m starting to remember other things.”
Pete nodded slowly. “The pain’s not gone. You’re just not drowning in it anymore. That’s what it looks like. It’s not moving on or forgetting. It’s learning to live with it.”
“There’s something else.” I said it plainly because I’d been sitting on it for weeks and the session felt like the right place. “At the birthday party—Bea was there. We stood near each other for a few seconds watching the boys. Nothing was said. But she looked at me and I could see she was taking stock of something.”
“How did that feel?”
“Good. Until I caught myself planning.”
“Why?”
“Because if I hope too much, I’ll start doing this for her instead of for me. And she’ll see that. She’ll know I’m not really changing—just performing change to win her back.”
Pete leaned forward. “You’ve been carrying two kinds of weight for eight months. Danny’s death and what you did to Bea. Are they the same kind of thing?”
