id you want the milk?” Nathaniel's mother asks. “I already had a bowl of cereal,” his father replies.

“Oh.” She starts to put it back in the refrigerator, but his father takes it out of her hand. “Maybe I'll have a little more.”

They look at each other, and then his mother steps back with a funny too-tight smile. “All right,” she says.

Nathaniel watches this the way he would watch a cartoon-knowing in the back of his head that something is not quite real or right, but attracted to the show all the same.

Last summer when he was outside with his father he'd chased an electric green dragonfly all the way across the garden and the pumpkin patch and into the birdbath. There it found a bright blue dragonfly, and for a while they'd watched the two of them nip and thrust at each other, their bodies swords.

“Are they fighting?” Nathaniel had asked.

“No, they're mating.” Before Nathaniel could even ask, his father explained : It was the way animals and bugs and things made babies.

“But it looks like they're trying to kill each other,” Nathaniel pointed out. Almost as soon as he said it, the two dragonflies hitched together like a shimmering space station, their wings beating like a quartet of hearts and their long tails quivering.

“Sometimes it's like that,” his father had answered. Quentin had spent the night tossing on that godawful mattress, wondering what the hell was keeping the jury. No case was a sure thing, but for God's sake, they had this murder on tape. It should have been pretty simple. Yet the jury had been deliberating since yesterday afternoon; and here it was nearly twenty-four hours later with no verdict.

He has walked past the jury room at least twenty times, trying ESP to will them toward a conviction. The bailiff posted outside the door is an older man with the ability to sleep on his feet. He snorts his way back to a deadpan position of authority as the prosecutor passes. “Anything?” Quentin asks.

“Lot of yelling. They just ordered lunch. Eleven turkey sandwiches and one roast beef.”

Frustrated, Quentin turns on his heel and heads down the hall again, only to crash into his son coming around the corner. “Gideon?”

“What's up.”

Gideon, in court. For a moment Quentin's heart stops, like it did a year ago . “What are you doing here?”

The boy shrugs, as if he can't figure it out himself. “I didn't have basketball practice today, and I figured I'd just come over and chill out.” He drags his sneaker on the floor to make it squeak. “See what it looks like from the other side, and all.”

A slow smile itches its way across Quentin's face as he claps his son on the shoulder. And for the first time in the ten years that Quentin Brown has been in a courthouse, he is rendered speechless.

Twenty-six hours; 1,560 minutes; 93,600 seconds. Call it what you like; waiting in any denomination takes a lifetime. I have memorized every inch of this conference room. I have counted the linoleum tiles on the floor, marked the scars on the ceiling, measured off the width of the windows. What are they doing in there?

When the door opens, I realize that the only thing worse than waiting is the moment that you realize a decision has been made.

A white handkerchief appears in the doorway, followed by Fisher.

“The verdict.” The words cut up my tongue. “It's in?”

“Not yet.”

Boneless, I sink back in the chair as Fisher tosses the handkerchief at me. “Is this in preparation for their finding?”

“No, it's me, surrendering. I'm sorry about yesterday.” He glances at me. “Although a little advance notice that you wanted to do the closing would have been nice.”

“I know.” I look up at him. “Do you think that's why the jury didn't come back fast with an acquittal?”

Fisher shrugs. "Maybe it's why they didn't come back fast with a conviction."

“Yeah, well. I've always been best at closings.”

He smiles at me. “I'm a cross-examination man, myself.” We look at each other for a moment, in complete accord. “What's the part you hate most about a trial?”

“Now. Waiting for the jury to come back.” Fisher exhales deeply. “I always have to calm down the client, who only wants a prediction about the outcome, and no one can predict that. You prosecutors are lucky; you just win or lose, and you don't have to reassure someone that he's not going to go to prison for the rest of his life when you know perfectly well that he ...“ He breaks off, because all the color has drained from my face. ”Well. Anyway. You know that no one can guess a jury's outcome.”

When I don't look particularly encouraged, he asks, “What's the hardest part for you?”

“Right before the state rests, because that's the last chance I have to make sure I got all the evidence in and that I did it right. Once I say those three words ... I know I'm going to find out whether or not I screwed up.” Fisher meets my eye. “Nina,” he says gently, “the state rests.” I lay on my side on an alphabet rug on the playroom floor, jamming the foot of a penguin into its wooden slot. “If I do this penguin puzzle one more time,” I say, “I will save the jury some trouble and hang myself.” Caleb looks up from where he is sitting with Nathaniel, sorting multicolored plastic teddy bears. “I want to go outside,” Nathaniel whines.

“We can't, buddy. We're waiting for some important news for Mommy.”

“But I want to!” Nathaniel kicks the table, hard.

“Maybe in a little while.” Caleb hands him a batch of bears. “Here, take some more.”

“No!” With one arm, Nathaniel swipes the entire tray off the table. The sorting containers bounce and roll into the block area; the plastic bears scatter to all four corners of the room. The resulting clatter rings inside my head, in the empty spot where I am trying so hard to think of absolutely nothing. I get to my feet, grab my son by the shoulders, and shake him. “You do not throw toys! You will pick up every last one of these, Nathaniel, and I mean it!”

Nathaniel, now, is sobbing at the top of his lungs. Caleb, tight-faced, turns on me too. “Just because you're at the end of your rope, Nina, doesn't mean that you-”

“'Scuse me.”

The voice at the door makes all three of us turn. A bailiff leans in, nods at us. “The jury's coming in,” he says.

“It's not a verdict,” Fisher whispers to me minutes later.

“How do you know?”

“Because the bailiff would have said so ... not just that the jury was back.” I draw back, dubious. “Bailiffs never tell me anything.”

“Trust me.”

I wet my lips. “Then why are we here?”

“I don't know,” Fisher admits, and we both turn our attention to the judge. He sits at the bench, looking overjoyed to have finally reached the end of this debacle. “Mr. Foreperson,” Judge Neal asks, “has the jury reached a verdict?”

A man in the front row of the jury box stands up. He takes off his baseball cap and tucks it under his arm, then clears his throat. “Your Honor, we've bee n trying, but we can't seem to get together on this. There's some of us that”

“Hold on, Mr. Foreperson, don't say any more. Have you deliberated about this case and have you taken a vote to see what every juror's position is on the issue of guilt or innocence?”

“We've done it a bunch of times, but it keeps coming back to a few that won't change their minds.”

The judge looks at Fisher, and then at Quentin. “Counsel, approach.” I stand up, too, and the judge sighs. “All right, Mrs. Frost, you too.” At the bench, he murmurs, “I'm going to give them an Allen charge. Any objections?”

“No objection,” Quentin says, and Fisher agrees. As we walk back to the defense table, I meet Caleb's eye, and silently mouth, “They're hung.” The judge begins to speak. “Ladies and gentlemen, you've heard all the facts, and you've heard all the evidence. I am aware it's been a long haul, and that you have a difficult decision to make. But I also know that you can reach closure . . . and that you're the best jury to do it. If the case has to be tried again, another group of jurors will not necessarily do a better job than you are doing.” He glances soberly at the group. “I urge you to go back to the jury room, to respectfully consider each other's opinions, and to see if some progress can't be made. At the end of the afternoon, I'm going to ask you to come back and let me know how you're doing.”

“Now what?” Caleb whispers, from behind me.

I watch the newly energized jury file out again. Now we wait. Watching someone tie themselves in a knot makes you squirm in your own seat, or so Caleb discovers after spending two and a half more hours with Nina while the jury is deliberating. She sits hunched forward on a tiny chair in the playroom, completely ignorant of Nathaniel making airplane sounds as he zooms around with his arms extended. Her eyes stare intensely at absolutely nothing; her chin rests on her fist.

“Hey,” Caleb says softly.

She blinks, comes back to him. “Oh . . . hey.”

“You okay?”

“Yes.” A smile stretches her lips thin. “Yes!” she repeats. It reminds Caleb of the time years ago that he attempted to teach her to water-ski: She is trying too hard, instead of just letting it happen. “Why don't we all go down to the vending machines?” he suggests. “Nathaniel can get some hot chocolate, and I'll treat you to the dishwater that passes for soup.”

“Sounds great.”

Caleb turns to Nathaniel and tells him they are going to get a snack. He runs to the door, and Caleb walks up behind him. “Come on,” he says to Nina.

“We're ready.”

She stares at him as if they have never had a conversation, much less one thirty seconds ago. “To do what?” she asks.

Patrick sits on a bench behind the courthouse, freezing his ass off, and watching Nathaniel whoop his way across a field. Why this child has so much energy at four-thirty in the afternoon is beyond him, but then he can remember back to when he and Nina used to spend entire days playing pond hockey without tiring or getting frostbite. Maybe time is only something you notice when you get old and have less of it at your disposal.

The boy collapses beside Patrick, his cheeks a fiery red, his nose running. “Got a tissue, Patrick?”

He shakes his head. “Sorry, Weed. Use your sleeve.” Nathaniel laughs, and then does just that. He ducks his head beneath Patrick's arm, and it makes Patrick want to shout. If only Nina could see this, her son seeking out someone's touch-oh, God, what it would do for her morale right now. He hugs Nathaniel close, drops a kiss on the top of his head.

“I like playing with you,” Nathaniel says.

“Well, I like playing with you too.”

“You don't yell.”

Patrick glances down at him. “Your mom been doing that?” Nathaniel shrugs, then nods. “It's like she got stolen and they left someone mean in her place who looks just like her. Someone who can't sit still and who doesn't hear me when I talk and when I do talk it's always giving her a headache.” He looks into his lap. “I want my old mom back.”

“She wants that too, Weed.” Patrick looks to the west, where the sun has begun to draw blood from the horizon. “Truth is, she's pretty nervous right now. She isn't sure what kind of news she's going to hear.” When Nathaniel shrugs, he adds, “You know she loves you.”

“Well,” the boy says defensively. “I love her too.” Patrick nods. You're not the only one, he thinks.

“A mistrial?” I say, shaking my head. “No. Fisher, I can't go through this again. You know trials don't get any better with age.”

“You're thinking like a prosecutor,” Fisher admonishes, “except this time, you're right.” He turns around from the window where he is standing. “I want you to chew on something tonight.”

“What?”

“Waiving the jury. I'll talk to Quentin in the morning, if you agree, and see if he's willing to let the judge decide the verdict.”

I stare at him. “You know that we were trying this case on the emotion, not the law. A jury might acquit based on emotion. But a judge is always going to rule based on the law. Are you crazy?”

“No, Nina,” Fisher answers soberly. “But neither were you.” We lie in bed that night with the weight of a full moon pressing down on us. I have told Caleb about my conversation with Fisher, and now we both stare at the ceiling, as if the answer might appear, skywritten with stars. I want Caleb to take my hand across the great expanse of this bed. I need that, to believe we are not miles apart.

“What do you think?” he asks.

I turn to him. In the moonlight his profile is edged in gold, the color of courage. “I'm not making decisions by myself anymore,” I answer. He comes up on an elbow, turning to me. “What would happen?” I swallow, and try to keep my voice from shaking. “Well, a judge is going to convict me, because legally, I committed murder. But the upside is ... I probably won't be sentenced as long as I would have been with a jury verdict.” Suddenly Caleb's face looms over mine. “Nina . . . you can't go to jail.” I turn away, so that the tear slips down the side of my face he cannot see. “I knew I was taking this chance when I did it.”

His hands tighten on my shoulders. “You can't. You just can't.”

“I'll be back.”

“When?”

“I don't know.”

Caleb buries his face in my neck, drawing in great draughts of air. And then suddenly I am clutching at him, too, as if there cannot be any distance between us today, because tomorrow there will be so much. I feel the rough pads of his hands mark my back; and the heat of his grief is searing. When he comes inside me I dig my nails into his shoulders, trying to leave behind a trace of myself. We make love with near violence, with so much emotion that the atmosphere around us hums. And then, like all things, it is over.

“But I love you,” Caleb says, his voice breaking, because in a perfect world, this should be all the excuse one needs.

That night I dream I am walking into an ocean, the waves soaking the hem of my cotton nightgown. The water is cold, but not nearly as cold as it usually is in Maine, and the beach beneath is a smooth lip of sand. I keep walking, even when the water reaches my knees, even when it brushes my hips and my nightgown sticks to my body like a second skin. I keep walking, and the water comes up to my neck, my chin. By the time I go under I realize I am going to drown.

At first I fight, trying to ration the air I have in my lungs. Then they start to burn, a circle of fire beneath my ribs. My wide eyes burst black, and my feet start to thrash, but I am getting nowhere. This is it, I think. Finally. With that realization I let my arms go still, and my legs go limp. I feel my body sinking and the water filling me, until I am curled on the sand at the base of the sea.

The sun is a quivering yellow eye. I get to my feet, and to my great surprise, begin to walk with ease on the bottom of the ocean floor.

Nathaniel doesn't move the hour I sit on his bed, watching him sleep. But when I touch his hair, unable to hold back any longer, he rolls over and blinks at me. “It's still dark,” he whispers.

“I know. It's not morning.”

I watch him trying to puzzle this out: What could have brought me, then, to wake him in the middle of the night? How am I supposed to explain to him that the next time I have the opportunity to do this, his body might reach the whole length of the bed? That by the time I come back, the boy I left behind will no longer exist?

“Nathaniel,” I say, with a shuddering breath, “I might be going away.” He sits up. “You can't, Mommy.” Smiling, he even finds a reason. “We just got back.”

“I know . . . but this isn't my choice.”

Nathaniel pulls the covers up to his chest, suddenly looking very small. “What did I do this time?”

With a sob I pull him onto my lap and bury my face against his hair. He rubs his nose against my neck, and it reminds me so much of him as an infant that I cannot breathe. I would trade everything, now, to have those minutes back, tucked into a miser's lockbox. Even the ordinary moments-driving in the car, cleaning up the playroom, cooking dinner with Nathaniel. They are no less miraculous simply because they are something we did as a matter of routine . It is not what you do with a child that brings you together ... it is the fact that you are lucky enough to do it at all.

I draw away to look at his face. That bow of a mouth, the slope of his nose. His eyes, preserving memories like the amber they resemble. Keep them, I think. Watch over them for me.

By now, I am crying hard. “I promise, it won't be forever. I promise that you can come see me. And I want you to know every minute of every day that I'm away from you . . . I'm thinking of how long it'll be before I come back.”

Nathaniel wraps his arms around my neck and holds on for dear life. "I don't want you to go."

“I know.” I draw back, holding his wrists loosely.

“I'll come with you.”

“I wish you could. But I need someone here to take care of your father.” Nathaniel shakes his head. “But I'll miss you.”

“And I'll miss you,” I say softly. “Hey, how about if we make a pact?”

“What's that?”

“A decision two people make together.” I try for a smile. “Let's agree not to miss each other. Is that a deal?”

Nathaniel looks at me for a long moment. “I don't think I can do it,” he confesses.

I pull him close again. “Oh, Nathaniel,” I whisper. “Me neither.” Nathaniel is glued to my side the next morning when we walk into the courthouse. The reporters that I have almost become accustomed to seem like a cruel torture, their questions and their blinding video cameras a modern gaunt let I have to survive. These will be my Before and After pictures; DA-cum-convict. Print your headlines now, I think, since I am going to jail. As soon as I reach the barrier of the double doors, I hand Nathaniel to Caleb and make a dead run for the restroom, where I dry heave into a toilet and splash water on my face and wrists. “You can get through this,” I say to the mirror. “You can at least end it with dignity.”

Taking a deep breath I push my way out the swinging door to where my family is waiting, and see Adrienne, the transsexual, wearing a red dress two sizes too small and a grin as large as Texas. “Nina!” she cries, and comes running to hug me. “Last place I ever thought I'd want to be is in a courtroom again, but honey, I'm here for you.”

“You're out?”

“Since yesterday. Didn't know if I'd make it in time, but that jury deliberation's taking longer than my sex change operation.”

Suddenly Nathaniel has wormed his way between us, and is doing his best to climb me like a tree. I heft him into my arms. “Nathaniel, this is Adrienne.”

Her eyes light up. “I have heard so much about you.” It is a toss-up as to who is more stunned by Adrienne's presence-Nathaniel or Caleb. But before I can offer any explanations, Fisher hurries toward us. I meet his gaze. “Do it,” I say.

Quentin finds Fisher waiting for him in the courtroom. “We have to speak to Judge Neal,” he says quietly.

“I'm not offering her a plea,” Quentin answers.

“And I'm not asking for one.” He turns, heading for the judge's chambers without waiting to see if the prosecutor will follow.

Ten minutes later, they are standing in front of Judge Neal, the angry heads of safari animals bearing witness. “Your Honor,” Fisher begins, “we've been here so long; it's clear that the jury is going to hang. I've talked to my client . . . and if Mr. Brown is willing, we'd like to submit this case to Your Honor and have you decide the facts and the verdict.”

Well, if Quentin was expecting anything it wasn't this. He looks at the defense attorney as if the man has lost his mind. Granted, nobody likes a mistrial, but to let the judge rule is to adhere, strictly, to the letter of the law-something far more beneficial to the prosecution, in this case, than the defense. Fisher Carrington has just handed Quentin a conviction on a silver platter. The judge stares at him. “Mr. Brown? What would the state like to do?” He clears his throat. "The state finds this perfectly acceptable, Your Honor."

“Fine. I'm going to let the jury go then. I need an hour to review the evidence, and then I'll make my ruling.” With a nod, the judge dismisses the two lawyers, and begins the process of deciding Nina Frost's future. Adrienne, it turns out, is a godsend. She gets Nathaniel out of my arms by making herself into a jungle gym when Caleb and I are wrung too dry to play. Nathaniel crawls over her back and then down the long slide of her shins. “If he's tiring you out,” Caleb says, “just tell him to stop.”

“Oh, honey, I've been waiting my whole life for this.” She flips Nathaniel upside down, so that he giggles.

I am torn between watching them and joining in. My biggest fear is that if I let myself touch my son again, nothing they will do will be able to drag me away.

When there is a knock at the playroom door, we all turn. Patrick stands uncomfortably at the threshold. I know what he wants, and I also know that he will not ask for it with my family here.

To my surprise, Caleb takes the decision out of everyone's hands. He nods toward Patrick, and then to me. “Go on,” he says.

So Patrick and I find ourselves walking down twisted basement corridors, a foot of space separating us. We travel so far in silence that I realize I have no idea where we now are. “How could you?” he finally bursts out.

“If you'd gone with another jury trial, at least, you'd have a shot at an acquittal.”

“And I would have dragged Nathaniel and Caleb and you and everyone else along through it again. Patrick, this has to stop. It has to be over. No matter what.”

He stops walking, leans against a heating duct. “I never really thought you'd go to jail.”

“There are a lot of places,” I reply, “that I thought I'd never go.” I smile faintly. “Will you bring me Chinese food every now and then?”

“No.” Patrick looks down at the floor between his shoes. “I won't be here, Nina.”

“You . . . what?”

“I'm moving. There are some job openings out in the Pacific Northwest I might take a look at.” He takes a deep breath. “I always wanted to see what it was like out there. I just didn't want to do it without you.”

“Patrick-”

With great tenderness, he kisses my forehead. “You will be fine,” he murmurs. “You've done it before.” He offers me a crooked smile to slip into my breast pocket. And then he walks down the hall, leaving me to find my own way back.

The bathroom door at the base of the staircase flies open, and suddenly Quentin Brown is no more than four feet away from me. “Mrs. Frost,” he sputters.

“After all this, I would think you could call me Nina.” It is an ethical violation for him to speak to me without Fisher present, and we both know it. Yet somehow, bending that rule doesn't seem quite so horrific, after all this. When he doesn't respond, I realize he doesn't feel the same way and I try to step around him. “If you'll excuse me, my family's waiting in the playroom.”

“I have to admit,” Quentin says as I am walking away, “I was surprised by your decision.”

I turn. “To let the judge rule?”

“Yes. I don't know if I'd do the same thing, if I were a defendant.” I shake my head. “Somehow, Quentin, I can't picture you as a defendant.”

“Could you picture me as a parent?”

It surprises me. “No. I never heard that you had a family.”

“A boy. Sixteen.” He stuffs his hands in his pockets. “I know, I know. You've done such a good job imagining me as a ruthless villain that it's hard to give me a vein of compassion.”

“Well.” I shrug. “Maybe not a ruthless villain.”

“An asshole then?”

“Your words, counselor,” I reply, and we both grin.

“Then again, people can surprise you all the time,” he muses. “For example, a district attorney who commits murder. Or an assistant attorney general that drives past a defendant's home at night just to make sure she's okay.” I snort. “If you drove by at all, it was to make sure I was still there.”

“Nina, didn't you ever wonder who in your office left you the lab report from the underwear?”

My jaw drops open. “My son's name,” Quentin says. “It's Gideon.” Whistling, he nods to me, and jogs up the staircase.

The courtroom is so quiet that I can hear Caleb breathing behind me. What he said the moment before we walked in to hear the judge's verdict echoes too, in the silence: I am proud of you.

Judge Neal clears his throat and begins to speak. “The evidence in this case clearly shows that on October thirtieth, 2001, the defendant Nina Frost went out, purchased a handgun, concealed it, and brought it into a Biddeford district courtroom. The evidence also shows that she positioned herself near Father Szyszynski, and intentionally and knowingly shot him four times in the head, thereby causing his death. The evidence is also clear that at the time she did these things, Nina Frost was under the mistaken impression that Father Szyszynski had sexually molested her five-year-old son.” I bow my head, each word a blow. “So what does the evidence not support?” the judge asks rhetorically. “Specifically, the defendant's contention that she was legally insane at the time of the shooting. Witnesses testified that she acted deliberately and methodically to exterminate the man who she thought had harmed her child. And at the time, the defendant was a trained, practicing assistant district attorney who knew very well that every person charged with a crime-Father Szyszynski includedwas innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Basically, this court believes Nina Frost to be a prosecutor through and through ... so much so, that to break a law, she would have had to give the act careful consideration.“ He raises his head and pushes his glasses up on his nose. ”And so I reject the defendant's insanity defense.”

A shuffling to my left, from Quentin Brown.

“However-”

Quentin stills.

“-in this state there is another reason to justify the act of murder-namely, if a defendant was under the influence of a reasonable fear or anger brought about by reasonable provocation. As a prosecutor, Nina Frost didn't have reason to be fearful or angry the morning of October thirtieth . . . yet as Nathaniel's mother, she did. Her son's attempt to identify the victim, the wild card of the DNA evidence, and the defendant's intimate knowledge of the treatment of a witness in the criminal justice system all add up, in this court's opinion, to reasonable provocation under the law.”

I have stopped breathing. This cannot be true.

“Will the defendant please rise?”

It is not until Fisher grabs my arm and hauls me to my feet that I remember the judge means me. “Nina Frost, I find you Not Guilty of Murder. I do find you Guilty of Manslaughter pursuant to 17-A M.R.S.A. Section 203 (1)(B ). Does the defendant wish to waive a presentence report and be sentenced today?”

“Yes, Your Honor,” Fisher murmurs.

The judge looks at me for the first time this morning. “I sentence you to twenty years in the Maine State Prison, with credit for the time you have already served.” He pauses. “The remainder of the twenty years will be suspended, and you'll be on probation for that time. You need to check in with your probation officer before you leave court today, and then, Mrs. Frost, you are free to go.”

The courtroom erupts in a frenzy of flashbulbs and confusion. Fisher embraces me as I burst into tears, and Caleb leaps over the bar. “Nina?” he demands. “In English?”

“It's . . . good.” I laugh up at him. “It's great, Caleb.” The judge, in essence, has absolved me. I will never have to serve out my prison term, as long as I manage not to kill anyone again. Caleb grabs me and swings me around; over his shoulder I see Adrienne pump her fist in the air. Behind her is Patrick. He sits with his eyes closed, smiling. Even as I watch, they blink open to focus on me. Only you, Patrick mouths silently; words I will wonder about for years.

When the reporters run off to call their affiliates with the verdict and the crowd in the gallery thins, I notice one other man. Quentin Brown has gathered his files and his briefcase. He walks to the gate between our tables, stops, and turns to me. He inclines his head, and I nod back. Suddenly my arm is wrenched behind me, and I instinctively pull away, certain that someone who has not understood the judge's verdict is about to put handcuffs on me again. “No,” I say, turning. “You don't understand . . .” But then the bailiff unlocks the electronic bracelet on my wrist. It falls to the floor, ringing out my release.

When I look up again, Quentin is gone.

After a few weeks, the interviews stop. The eagle eye of the news refocuses on some other sordid story. A caravan of media vehicles snakes its way south, and we go back to what we used to be.

Well, most of us do.

Nathaniel is stronger every day; and Caleb has picked up a few new jobs. Patrick called me from Chicago, his halfway point to the West Coast. So far, he is the only one who has been brave enough to ask me how I will fill my days now that I am not a prosecutor.

It has been such a big part of me for so long that there's no easy answer. Maybe I'll write the book everyone seems to want me to write. Maybe I'll give free legal advice to senior citizens at the town recreation hall. Maybe I will just stay at home and watch my son grow up.

I tap the envelope in my hand. It is from the Bar Disciplinary Committee, and it has been on the kitchen counter, unopened, for nearly two months. There's no point in opening it now, either. I know what it will say. Sitting down at the computer, I type a very concise note. I am tartly turning in my license; I no longer wish to practice law. Sincerely, Nina Frost.

I print it, and an envelope to match. Fold, lick, seal, stamp. Then I put on my boots and walk down the driveway to the mailbox.

“Okay,” I say out loud, after I put it inside and raise the red flag. “Okay,” I repeat, when what I really mean is, What do I do now?

There's always one week in January that's a thaw. Without warning, the temperature climbs to fifty degrees; the snow melts in puddles wide as a lake; people take to sitting on Adirondack chairs in their shorts, watching it all happen.

This year, however, the thaw's gone on for a record number of days. It started the day of Nina's release. That very afternoon, the town skating pond was closed due to spotty ice; by the end of the week teenagers were skateboarding down sidewalks; there was even word of a few crocuses pushing their way up through the inevitable mud. It has been good for business, that's for sure-construction that couldn't get done in the dead of winter has suddenly been given a reprieve. And it has also, for the first time Caleb can recall, made the sap run in the maple trees this early in the year.

Yesterday Caleb set up his taps and buckets; today, he is walking the perimeter of his property, collecting the sap. The sky seems crisp as a lancet, and Caleb has his shirtsleeves rolled up to the elbow. The mud is a succubus, grabbing for his boots, but even that can't slow him. Days like this, they just don't come around often enough.

He pours the sap into huge vats. Forty gallons of this sweet juice will boil down to a single gallon of maple syrup. Caleb makes it right on the kitchen stove, in a spaghetti pot, straining each batch through a sieve before it thickens. For Nina and Nathaniel, it's all about the end product-pouring it on pancakes and waffles. But to Caleb, the beauty is in the way you get there. The blood of a tree, a spout, and a bucket. Steam rising, the scent filling every corner of the house. There is nothing quite like it: knowing every breath you take is bound to be sweet.

Nathaniel is building a bridge, although it might turn out to be a tunnel. The cool thing about Legos is that you can change them right in the middle. Sometimes when he builds he pretends he is his father, and he does it with the same careful planning. And sometimes when he builds he pretends he is his mother, and takes a tower as high as it can go before it falls to the ground.

He has to work around the dog's tail, because Mason happens to be sleeping right on the middle of his bedroom floor, but that's all right too, because this could be a village with a monstrous beast. In fact, he might be creating the wicked awesome getaway boat.

But where will they all go? Nathaniel thinks for a minute, then lays down four greens and four reds, begins to build. He makes sturdy walls and wide windows. A level of a house, his father has told him, is called a story. Nathaniel likes that. It makes him feel like maybe he is living between the covers of a book himself. Like maybe everyone in every home is sure to get a happy ending.

Laundry is always a good, mindless start. Ours seems to reproduce at the dank bottom of its bin, so that regardless of how careful we are with our clothes, there is always a full basket every other day. I fold the clean wash and carry it upstairs, putting Nathaniel's items away before I tackle my own. It is when I go to fold a pair of my jeans over a hanger that I see the duffel bag. Has it really been sitting here, shoved into the back of the closet, for two weeks? Caleb probably never even noticed; he has enough clothes in his drawers to have overlooked unpacking the bag he took with him to the motel. But seeing it is an eyesore; it reminds me of the moment he moved out. I pull out a few long-sleeved shirts, some boxers. It is not until I toss them into the laundry bin that I realize my hand is sticky. I rub my fingers together, frown, pick up one shirt again and shake it out.

There is a big, green stain on one corner.

There are stains on some socks too. It looks as if something has spilled all over, but when I look in the bag, there's no open bottle of shampoo. Then, it doesn't smell like shampoo either. It is a scent I cannot place, exactly. Something industrial.

The last item in the bag is a pair of jeans. Out of habit, I reach into the pockets to make sure Caleb hasn't left money or receipts inside. In the left rear pocket is a five-dollar bill. And in the right rear pocket are boarding passes for two US Air flights: one from Boston to New Orleans, one from New Orleans to Boston, both dated January 3, 2002. The day after Nathaniel's competency hearing.

Caleb's voice comes from a few feet behind me. “I did what I had to do.” Caleb is yelling at Nathaniel to stop playing with the antifreeze. “How many times do I have to tell you . . . It's poison.” Mason, lapping at the puddle because it tastes so sweet; he does not know any better.

“The cat,” I whisper, turning to him. “The cat died too.”

"I know. I figure it got at the rest of the cocoa. Ethylene glycol is toxic . . . but it's sweet enough.“ He reaches for me, but I back away. ”You told me his name. You said it wasn't over yet. All I did,“ Caleb says softly, ”is finish what you started."

“Don't.” I hold up my hand. “Caleb, don't tell me this.”

“You're the only one I can tell.”

He is right, of course. As his wife, I am not obligated to testify against him. Not even if Gwynne is autopsied, and there are traces of poison in the tissues. Not even if evidence leads right to Caleb.

But then, I have spent three months learning the repercussions of taking the law into one's own hands. I have watched my husband walk out the door-not because he was judging me, it turns out, but because he was trying himself. I have come so close to losing everything I ever wanted-a life I was too foolish to value until it was nearly taken away.

I stare at Caleb, waiting for an explanation.

Yet there are some feelings so far-flung and wide that words cannot cover them. As language fails Caleb, his eyes lock onto mine, and he spells out what he cannot speak. His hands come up to clasp each other tightly. To someone who does not know how to listen in a different way, it looks like he is praying for the best. But me, I know the sign for marriage.

It is all he needs to say to make me understand.

Suddenly Nathaniel bursts into our bedroom. “Mom, Dad!” he yells. “I made the coolest castle in the world. You have to see it.” He spins before he has even come to a complete stop, and runs back, expecting us to follow.

Caleb watches me. He cannot take the first step. After all, the only way to communicate is to find someone who can comprehend; the only way to be forgiven is to find someone who is willing to forgive. So I start for the door, turning back at the threshold. “Come on,” I say to Caleb. “He needs us.”

It happens when I am trying to come down the stairs superfast, my feet ahead of the rest of me. One of the steps just isn't where it is supposed to be, and I fall really hard onto the railing where hands go. I hit the part of my arm that makes a corner, the part with the name that sounds just like what it is. L-bow.

The hurt feels like a shot, a needle going in right there and spreading out like fire under the rest of my arm. I can't feel my fingers, and my hand goes wide. It hurts more than when I fell on the ice last year and my ankle got as fat as the rest of my leg. It hurts more than when I went over the handlebars of my bike and scraped up the whole front of my face and needed two stitches. It hurts so much that I have to get past the ouch of it before I can remember to cry.

“Mooooooooooom!”

When I yell like that, she can come quick as a ghost, the air empty one minute and full of her the next. “What hurts?” she cries. She touches all the places I am holding close to myself.

“I think I broke my funny bone,” I say.

“Hmm.” She moves that arm up and down. Again. Then she puts her hands on my shoulders and looks up at me. “Tell a joke.”

“Mom!”

“How else are we going to know for sure if it's broken?” I shake my head. “It doesn't work that way.”

She picks me up and carries me into the kitchen. “Says who?” She laughs, and before I know it I am laughing back, which must mean I'm going to be okay after all.