“Will you be okay?” I ask.
She nods and smiles faintly. Her eyes are suspiciously bright with tears, and her golden head bends for a moment before straightening. “I always am, sweetheart. Don’t worry about me. Just take care of yourself.”
Then, she disappears down the hall, and I listen to the sound of her suitcase wheels, the soft thump as she drags it down the stairs. The front door opens, spilling a draft of cold air into the house, and then closes with a slow, final click.
I sit on the bed, letting the dark fill up the corners of the room. It’s a long time before I move, and when I do, it’s only to close the bedroom door.
The house is silent again, deeper than before. Not the silence of waiting, but the kind that happens after someone’s last word.
I lie on my side, staring at the phone on the nightstand. I think about calling Kayleigh, or maybe Stella, just to hear a voice. But I don’t. Instead, I count the seconds between the blinks of thesecurity lights outside, and try not to think about the man of the house, and what’s left for me in this empty, echoing place.
At some point, I must fall asleep, because the next thing I know, it’s dark as the inside of a stone, and I’m dreaming of Rome, of winding alleys and orange lamplight, and a pair of hands on my waist, strong and sure and inescapable.
But even in the dream, I know it can only be that: a dream, and never reality.
3
HE CLARIFIES THE ASSIGNMENT
KENT
If the hospital has a smell, it’s the same everywhere: phenolic scrub, sweat buried under deodorant, a brittle floral fog from air freshener nobody asked for. At the end of every shift, the odor leaches into my skin, clings to the collar of my starched shirt and the roots of my hair. It follows me, even now, as I unlock the door to the house—my house, though it’s too big for me, a mausoleum by any other name—and step into the foyer. A shiver runs up my spine as the furnace kicks on, stirring the lemon-polished air with a faint, mechanical sigh.
I pause, letting my eyes adjust to the filtered light. The marble is clean, footprints erased by the cleaning crew, not a throw pillow out of place. A half-hearted attempt at a home, but it works, or it used to, when Jeannine was still around to oversee the pantomime of family. Now it’s just me, and the expectation of her—though that, too, is fading.
Except tonight, there’s a new presence. I hear it before I see her: the creak and settle of a body shifting somewhere upstairs, likely in the library. I hang my overcoat on the polished banister, and the scent of the hospital rises, sharp and medicinal, from thelining. I force myself to exhale through my nose, try to let the domestic atmosphere swallow it up.
But nothing erases the ache in my chest as I take the stairs to the second level, and sure enough, when I peer into the library, she’s there. Mary Kate, legs folded under her in a chair that once belonged to my grandfather, is bathed in the last long streaks of amber light. Her hair is the color of wheat fields on the tail end of summer, shot through with platinum and gold, and it spills over the armrest in loose, accidental waves. She’s reading, of course—she’s always reading—one finger crooked under a line of text as if she’s tracing the secret contours of a map. I know that book. Rick Steves, Rome edition, the spine obliterated by years of hope. She’s never been, although it’s clear my stepdaughter hopes to, one day. She sits beside a stack of Italian-language books, some of which look like they’re for school.
Mary Kate looks up, and I catch her at the precise instant when she registers my presence. Her eyes are blue. Not the shallow blue of her mother’s, but deep—lit up by the low sun, almost liquid. For a moment, neither of us moves, as if we’re frozen in a tableau. Then I clear my throat.
“Hi,” I say. My voice is lower than I intend, rough at the edges.
Mary Kate sits up straighter, uncurls her legs, and sets the guidebook across her knees. Her sweatshirt rides up, exposing a paler band of skin at her waist, and I have to look away for a second to keep my expression neutral. I move to the wet bar, pour myself a finger of rye, though I don’t drink it. The ritual helps.
She’s the first to speak. “You’re back early.”
I nod, watching the way she smooths her hair behind one ear, the strands golden and gleaming. “Rounds finished early. I have two surgeries tomorrow, so I wanted to get a head start on prep.” I lean back against the mahogany bookshelf, the wood digging into my spine. “Did you get settled in okay?”
Mary Kate smiles, and my heartrate accelerates in response. “Yeah. The room’s just like I remember. I think the bed’s actually more comfortable than the one in my apartment.”
“I’d hope so,” I chuckle. “That mattress cost more than my first car.”
She laughs. The sound is high and soft, but there’s an undertow of something less innocent. She catches herself, glances down at the book, and taps it with her index finger. “I was just, um—studying. For my final.”
“Italian?”
She nods, the tips of her ears going pink. “It’s stupid, but I keep messing up the pronouns. I can conjugate the verbs, but I get all twisted up in the gender stuff. I feel like I sound like a kindergartener half the time.”
I take a measured sip of rye, let the burn coil down my throat, and try to keep my eyes on her face. “But you’re trying, and that’s what counts.” I step away from the bar, set the glass on the desk, and pretend to scan the titles on my bookshelves. The tomes are arranged by continent, then by author’s last name. I know them all by heart, but the distraction helps.
Mary Kate swings her feet to the floor, stands, and crosses to the window. She presses a palm to the glass, as if she can touch the dusk gathering outside. The light refracts through her hair,making a halo. “Have you ever been?” she asks, voice so quiet it’s nearly lost in the cavernous hush of the house.
“To Italy?” I ask.
She nods, tracing a circle on the frosted pane.
“No,” I say. “I always thought I’d go with—” The word fails me. Jeannine, or someone like her. A wife, a daughter. A life that never happened. “—with family,” I finish, lamely.
