eredith came up with a plan and stuck to it. She’d decided that two afternoons and an evening with Mom would be enough time for Nina to understand the nursing home decision. Yes, Mom had gotten better in the past few weeks, but Meredith didn’t believe for a second that she was well enough to care for herself yet.

And it was important—crucial, even—that Nina understood the situation. Meredith didn’t want to carry the burden of this decision alone any longer. Mom had been in the home for almost six weeks and her ankle was fully healed. Soon a permanent choice would have to be made, and Meredith refused to do it alone.

At four-thirty, she left the office and drove to the nursing home. Once there, she waved at Sue Ellen, the receptionist, and sailed past, her head held high, her keys in one hand, her handbag in the other. At Mom’s room, she paused just long enough to tell herself she didn’t really have a headache, and then she opened the door.

Inside, a pair of blue-coverall-clad men were cleaning: one was mopping the floor, the other was wiping down the window. All of Mom’s personal items were gone. On the bed, instead of the brand-new bedding Meredith had bought, there was a plain blue mattress.

“Where’s Mrs. Whitson?”

“She moved out,” one of the men said without looking up. “Didn’t give us much warning.”

Meredith blinked. “Excuse me?”

“Moved out.”

Meredith spun on her heel and walked back to the front desk. “Sue Ellen,” she said, pressing two fingertips to her left temple. “Where is my mother?”

“She left with Nina. Moved out, just like that. No notice or nothing.”

“Well. This is a mistake. My mother will be back—”

“There’s no room now, Meredith. Mrs. McGutcheon is taking her place. We never know for sure, of course, but we don’t expect to have a room available again until after July.”

Meredith was too mad to be polite. Saying nothing, she marched out of the building and got in her car. For the first time in her life, she didn’t give a shit about the posted speed limit, and in twelve minutes she was at Belye Nochi and out of her car.

Inside, the whole house reeked of smoke. In the kitchen, she found dirty plates piled in the sink and an open pizza box on the counter. More than half of the pizza was left in the box.

But that wasn’t the worst of it.

A misshapen pot sat slumped over the front burner. Meredith didn’t need to reach for it to know that it had melted to the burner.

She was about to charge up the stairs when she glanced out at the side yard. Through the wood-paned French doors, she saw them: Mom and Nina were sitting together on the iron bench.

Meredith opened one of the French doors so hard it clattered against the wall.

As she crossed the yard, she heard her mother’s familiar story voice, and knew immediately that the bouts of confusion weren’t over.

“... she mourns the loss of her father, who is imprisoned in the red tower by the Black Knight, but life goes on. This is a terrible, terrible lesson that every girl must learn. There are still swans to be fed in the ponds of the castle garden, and white summer nights when the lords and ladies meet at two in the morning to stroll the riverbanks. She doesn’t know how hard one winter can be, how roses can freeze in an instant and fall to the ground, how girls can learn to hold fire in their pale white hands—”

“That’s enough of the story, Mom,” Meredith said, trying not to sound as pissed off as she was. “Let’s go inside.”

“Don’t stop her—” Nina said.

“You’re an idiot,” Meredith said to Nina, helping Mom to her feet, leading her into the house and up the stairs, where she got her settled in the rocker with her knitting.

Back downstairs, she found Nina in the kitchen. “What in the hell were you thinking?”

“Did you hear the story?”

“What?”

“The story. Was that the peasant girl and the prince? Do you remem—”

Meredith took her sister by the wrist and pulled her into the dining room, switching on the lights.

It looked exactly as it had on the day Mom fell off the chair. Strips of wallpaper were gone; the blank valleys looked like old wounds next to the vibrant color of what remained. Here and there, reddish black smears stained both the wallpaper and the vacant strips.

Outside, somewhere in the fields, a truck backfired.

Meredith turned to Nina, but before she could say anything, she heard footsteps thundering down the stairs.

Mom ran into the kitchen, carrying a huge coat. “Did you hear the guns? Downstairs! Now!”

Meredith took her mother by the arm, hoping her touch would help. “That was just a truck backfiring, Mom. Everything is fine.”

“My lion is crying,” Mom said, her eyes glassy and unfocused. “He’s hungry.”

“There’s no hungry lion here, Mom,” Meredith said in an even, soothing voice. “Do you want some soup?” she asked quietly.

Mom looked at her. “We have soup?”

“Lots of it. And bread and butter and kasha. No one is hungry here.” Meredith gently took the coat from her mother. Tucked inside the pocket, she found four bottles of glue.

The confusion left as quickly as it had come. Mom straightened, looked at her daughters, and then walked out of the kitchen.

Nina turned to Meredith. “What the fuck?”

“You see?” Meredith said. “She goes... crazy sometimes. That’s why she needs to be someplace safe.”

“You’re wrong,” Nina said, still staring at the doorway through which Mom had just passed.

“You’re so much smarter than I am, Nina. So tell me, what am I wrong about?”

“That wasn’t nuts.”

“Oh, really? And just what was it?”

Nina finally faced her. “Fear.”

Nina was hardly surprised when Meredith started cleaning the kitchen, and with a martyr’s zeal. She knew her sister was pissed. She should have cared about that, but she couldn’t.

Instead, she thought about the promise she’d made to her father.

Make her tell you the story of the peasant girl and the prince.

At the time it had seemed pointless, really; impossible. A dying man’s last desperate hope to make three women sit down together.

But Mom was falling apart without him. He’d been right about that. And he’d thought the fairy tale could help her.

Meredith banged a pot down on one of the remaining burners and then swore. “We can’t use the damn stove until we can get rid of this pot you melted.”

“Use the micro,” Nina said distractedly.

Meredith spun around. “That’s your answer? Use the micro. That’s all you have to say?”

“Dad made me promise—”

Meredith dried her hands on a towel and threw it on the counter. “Oh, for God’s sake. We aren’t going to help her by making her tell us fables. We’ll help her by keeping her safe.”

“You want to lock her away again. Why? So you can have lunch with the girls?”

“How dare you say that to me? You.” Meredith moved closer, her voice lowering. “He used to pore through magazines, looking for his ‘little girl’s’ pictures. Did you know that? And he checked the mail and messages every day for calls that hardly ever came. So don’t you dare call me selfish.”

“Enough.”

Mom was standing in the doorway, dressed in her nightgown, with her hair uncharacteristically unbound. Her collarbone stuck out prominently beneath her veiny skin; a small three-tiered Russian-style cross hung from a thin gold strand coiled around her neck. With all that pallor—white hair, pale skin, white gown—she looked almost translucent. Except for those amazing blue eyes. Now they were alight with anger. “Is this how you honor him, by fighting?”

“We’re not fighting,” Meredith said, sighing. “We’re just worried about you.”

“You think I have gone crazy,” Mom said.

“I don’t,” Nina said, looking up. “I noticed the new column in the winter garden, Mom. I saw the letters.”

“What letters?” Meredith demanded.

“It is nothing,” Mom said.

“It’s something,” Nina said.

Her mother made no sign of having heard. No sigh. No flinch. No looking away. She simply walked over to the kitchen table and sat down.

“We don’t know anything about you,” Nina said.

“The past does not matter.”

“It’s what you’ve always said, and we let you. Or maybe we didn’t care. But now I do,” Nina answered.

Mom looked up slowly, and this time there was no mistaking the clarity in her eyes, nor the sadness. “You will keep asking me, won’t you? Of course you will. Meredith will try to stop you because she is afraid, but there is no stopping you.”

“Dad made me promise. He wanted us to hear one of your fairy tales all the way to the end. I can’t let him down.”

“I know better than to make promises to the dying. Now you have learned this lesson, too.” She stood up, her shoulders only a little stooped. “It would break your father’s heart to hear you two fighting. You are lucky to have each other. Act like it.” Then she walked out of the room.

They heard her door slam shut upstairs.

“Look, Nina,” Meredith said after a long silence. “I don’t give a shit about her fairy tales. I’ll take care of her because I promised Dad and because it’s the right thing to do. But what you’re talking about—trying to get to know her—it’s a kamikaze mission and I’ve crashed once too often. Count me out.”

“You think I don’t know that?” Nina said. “I’m your sister. I know how hard you tried with her.”

Meredith turned abruptly back to the stove, attacking the melted pot as if treasure lay beneath it.

Nina got up and went to her sister. “I understand why you put her in that terrible place.”

Meredith turned. “You do?”

“Sure. You thought she was going looney tunes.”

“She is looney tunes.”

Nina didn’t know what to say, how even to frame her opinion so that it made sense. All she knew was that she’d lost some essential piece of herself lately, and maybe fulfilling the promise to her father would help her get it back. “I’m going to get her to tell me that fairy tale—all of it—or die trying.”

“Do what you want,” Meredith said finally, sighing. “You always do.”

At work, Meredith tried to lose herself in the everyday minutiae of running the orchard and the warehouses, but nothing she did was right. It felt as if there were a valve in her chest tightening with every breath she took. The pressure building up behind it was going to blow any minute. After the third time she yelled at an employee, she gave up and left before she could do more damage. She tossed a packet of papers on Daisy’s desk, said tensely, “File this, please,” and walked away before Daisy could ask a question.

She got in her car and just drove. At first she had no idea where she was going; somewhere along the way, she found herself following an old forgotten road. In some ways, it led back to her youth.

She parked in front of the Belye Nochi gift shop. It was a lovely little building set back from the highway and ringed by ancient, flowering apple trees.

Long ago, it had been a roadside fruit stand; here, Meredith had spent some of the best summers of her life, selling their ripe, perfect apples to tourists.

She stared through the windshield at the white clapboard building, its eaves strung with white lights. Come summer, there would be flowers everywhere—in planters by the door, in baskets on the porch, twined up the fence line.

It had been her idea to convert this fruit stand into a gift shop. She still remembered the day she’d approached Dad with the plan. She’d been a young mother with a baby on each hip.

It’ll be great, Dad. Tourists will love it.

That’s a killer idea, Meredoodle. You’re going to be my shining star....

She’d poured her heart and soul into this place, choosing every item they sold with exquisite care. And it had been a rousing success, so much so that they’d added on twice and still they didn’t have enough room to sell all the beautiful souvenirs and crafts made in this valley.

When she’d quit the gift shop and moved into the warehouse, it had been to make her father happy.

Looking back on it now, that was when it had begun, this life of hers that seemed to be about everyone else....

She put the car in reverse and drove away, wishing vaguely that she hadn’t stopped by. For the next hour, she just drove, seeing the changes spring had made on the landscape. By the time she pulled into her own driveway, it was dusk, and the view was slowly darkening.

Inside the house, she fed the dogs and started dinner and then took a bath, lying in the water so long it grew cold.

She was still so confused and upset by today’s events that she didn’t know what to do or what to want. All she really knew for sure was that Nina was screwing everything up, making Meredith’s life harder. And there was no doubt in her mind that it would all collapse into a big fat mess that Meredith would have to clean up.

She was sick to death of being where the buck stopped.

She dried off and slipped into a pair of comfortable sweats and left the bathroom. As she was toweling off her hair, she glanced at the big king-sized bed along the far wall.

She remembered, with a sharp longing, the day she and Jeff had bought that bed. It had been too expensive, but they’d laughed about the expense and paid for it with a credit card. When the bed had been delivered, they’d come home from work early and fallen onto it, laughing and kissing, and christening it with their passion.

That was what she needed now: passion.

She needed to rip off her clothes and fall into bed and forget all about Nina and Mom and nursing homes and fairy tales.

The second she had the thought, it calcified into a plan. Feeling excited for the first time in months, she changed into a sexy nightgown and went downstairs, where she made a fire and poured herself a glass of wine and waited for Jeff to get home from work.

At eleven o’clock that night, she was still waiting. And that sense of excitement had slowly melted into anger.

Where in the hell was he?

By the time he finally walked into the living room, she’d had three glasses of wine and dinner was ruined.

“Where the hell have you been?” she said, rising.

He frowned. “What?”

“I made a romantic dinner. It’s ruined now.”

“You’re pissed that I’m home late? You’ve got to be kidding me.”

“Where were you?”

“Researching my book.”

“In the middle of the night?”

“It’s hardly the middle of the night. But, yeah. I’ve been doing it since January, Mere. You just haven’t noticed. Or cared.” He walked away from her and went into his office, slamming the door behind him.

She followed him, throwing the door open. “I wanted you tonight,” she said.

“Well, pardon me all to hell for not giving a shit. You’ve ignored me for months. It’s been like living with a goddamn ghost, but now all of a sudden, because you’re horny, I’m supposed to change gears and be here for you? It doesn’t work that way.”

“Fine. I hope you’re comfortable here tonight.”

“It’ll be a hell of a lot warmer than your bed.”

She walked out of the office and slammed the door behind her, but with that crack of sound, the anger left her, and without it, she felt lost. Lonely.

She should say she was sorry, tell him about her shitty day....

She was about to do that when she saw the pale bluish light slide along beneath the door. He’d turned his computer on and started writing.

She turned from the door and went upstairs, crawling into their bed. In twenty years of marriage, it was the first time he’d slept on the sofa after a fight, and without him, she couldn’t sleep.

At five o’clock, she finally gave up trying and went downstairs to apologize.

He was already gone.

That morning, Meredith went for a run (six miles this time; she was feeling particularly stressed out), called both of her daughters, and still got to work before nine. As soon as she was at her desk, she called Parkview and spoke to the director, who was none too happy about Mom’s sudden exit. She learned—again—that they didn’t expect an opening in the near future. Things could change, of course (which meant someone could die; someone else’s family could be shattered), but there was no way to guarantee a spot.

Nina would never stay long enough to actually help. In the past fifteen years, Meredith couldn’t remember her sister staying at Belye Nochi longer than a week, ten days at most. Nina might be world-famous and renowned in her field, but she was not reliable. She’d even bailed as Meredith’s maid of honor—at the last minute, with no time to get a replacement—because of some assassination in Central America. Or Mexico. Meredith still didn’t know; all she knew was that one minute Nina was there for her, trying on bridesmaid dresses, and the next minute she was gone.

There was a knock at the door. Meredith looked up just in time to see Daisy waltz in carrying a manila folder. “I’ve got the field and orchardist reports here.”

“Great,” Meredith said. “Just leave them on my desk.”

Daisy hesitated and Meredith thought, Oh, no. Here it comes. She’d known Daisy since childhood, and hesitant she was not. “I heard,” Daisy said, closing the door behind her. “About Nina kidnapping your mom.”

Meredith smiled tiredly. “That’s a bit overly dramatic. I’ll handle it.”

“Of course you will, but honey, should you?” Daisy put the folder down on the desk. “I can run this place, you know,” she said quietly. “Your dad trained me. All you have to do is ask for help.”

Meredith nodded. It was true, although she’d never really thought about it before. Daisy did know the orchard and its operation better than anyone except Meredith herself. She’d worked here for twenty-nine years. “Thanks.”

“But you don’t really know how to do that, do you, Meredith?”

Meredith fought the urge to roll her eyes. It was what Jeff said to her all the time. Was that really such a flaw? To do what needed to be done? “Can you get Dr. Burns on the phone for me, Daisy?”

“Of course.” Daisy headed for the door.

A moment later, Daisy put through the call and Jim answered.

“Hey, Jim,” she said. “It’s Meredith.”

“I expected you to call. I heard from Parkview today.” He paused. “Nina?”

“Naturally. She’s seen The Great Escape one too many times. They don’t know when they’ll have another opening, and there’s no way we can afford live-in help. Can you recommend another nursing home?”

It was a moment before Jim said, “I’ve spoken to her doctor at Parkview, and with the physical therapist who worked with her. I also visited Anya once a week.”

Meredith felt herself tensing up. “And?”

“None of us witnessed any significant confusion or dementia. The only time she got a little rattled was when that storm hit last month. Apparently the thunder scared her and she told everyone she needed to get to the roof. But a lot of the residents were upset by the noise.” He drew in a deep breath. “Your dad used to say that Anya battled depression every winter. Something about the cold and the snow bothering her. That, plus the grief... anyway, bottom line: I don’t believe she is suffering from Alzheimer’s or even severe dementia. I can’t diagnose what isn’t visible to me, Meredith.”

Meredith felt as if a huge weight had suddenly been placed on her shoulders. “Now what? How can I take care of her and keep her safe? I can’t run Belye Nochi and my own home and be there for Mom all the time. She was cutting herself, for God’s sake.”

“I know,” he said gently. “I’ve made some calls. There’s a senior complex in Wenatchee that’s really nice. It’s called Riverton. She would have an apartment with a backyard that’s big enough for some gardening. She has the choice of cooking her meals or going to the complex’s dining room. There’s an opening in mid-June for a one-bedroom. I asked the manager to reserve it for you, but they’ll need a deposit quickly. Ask for Junie.”

Meredith wrote it all down. “Thank you, Jim. I really appreciate your help.”

“No problem.” He paused. “How are you, Meredith? You didn’t look so good the last time I saw you.”

“Thanks, Doc.” She tried to laugh. “I’m tired, but that’s to be expected.”

“You do too much.”

“The story of my life. Thanks again.” She hung up before he could say more. Reaching down to the floor, she picked up her purse and headed out of her office.

At Belye Nochi, she found Nina in the kitchen, reheating a pot full of goulash.

Nina smiled at her. “I’m watching it, see? No fire yet.”

“I need to talk to you and Mom. Where is she?”

Nina cocked her head toward the dining room. “Guess.”

“The winter garden?”

“Of course.”

“Damn it, Neens.” Meredith walked through the damaged dining room and went out to Mom, who was sitting on the iron bench. At least she was dressed for the cool weather this time.

“Mom?” Meredith said. “I need to talk to you. Can we go inside?”

Mom straightened; only then did Meredith realize how soft and rounded she’d looked before.

Together, neither touching nor speaking, they walked back into the house. In the living room, Meredith got Mom settled in a chair and then built a fire. By the time she was finished, Nina was with them, sprawled out on the sofa, with her stockinged feet propped on the coffee table.

“What’s up, Mere?” she asked, flipping through an old National Geographic. “Hey, here’s my shot. The one that won the Pulitzer,” she said, smiling, showing off the two-page spread.

“I spoke with Dr. Burns today.”

Nina set the magazine aside.

“He... agrees with me that the nursing home isn’t the right place for Mom.”

“Uh. Duh,” Nina said.

Meredith refused to rise to the bait. She kept her gaze on Mom. “But we both think this house is too much for you to handle alone. Jim found a nice place in Wenatchee. A senior condominium-like complex. He says you could have a lovely little one-bedroom unit that would have its own kitchen. But if you didn’t feel like cooking, there’s a dining room, too. It’s right downtown. You could walk to the stores and the knitting shop.”

“What about my winter garden?” Mom asked.

“There’s a backyard with the unit. You could build a winter garden there. The bench, the fencing, the columns; everything.”

“She doesn’t need to move,” Nina said. “This is her home and I’m here to help out.”

Meredith finally snapped. “Really, Nina? How long can we count on you? Or will this be like my wedding?”

“There was an assassination that week,” Nina said, looking uncomfortable suddenly.

“Or like Dad’s seventieth birthday? What happened that time? A flood, wasn’t it? Or was that the earthquake?”

“I’m not going to apologize for my work.”

“I’m not asking you to. I’m just saying that you might have the best intentions in the world, but if something terrible happened in India tomorrow, all we’d see of you is your ass as you walked out of the door. I can’t be with Mom every second and she can’t be alone all the time.”

“And this would make it easier on you,” Mom said.

Meredith searched her mother’s face for sarcasm or judgment, or even confusion, but all she saw was resignation. It had been a question, not an indictment. “Yes,” she said, wondering why the affirmation made her feel as if she’d failed her father.

“Then I will go. I do not care where I live anymore,” Mom said.

“I’ll pack up everything you need,” Meredith said. “So you’re ready to go next month. You won’t have to do a thing.”

Mom stood up. She looked at Meredith, her blue eyes soft with emotion. It was a look that lasted a heartbeat—and then was gone. Turning on her heel, she went upstairs. The bedroom door slammed shut behind her.

“She doesn’t belong in some glorified nursing home,” Nina said. Meredith honestly hated her sister for that. “What are you going to do about it?”

“What do you mean?”

“Are you going to pay for a live-in companion, someone who can do all the shopping and cleaning and bill-paying? Or maybe you’re going to promise to stick around for years? Oh, wait. Your promises don’t mean shit.”

Nina slowly stood, faced Meredith. “I’m not the only one who breaks promises in this family. You promised him you’d take care of Mom.”

“And that’s what I’m doing.”

“Oh, really? What if he were here right now, listening to you talk about moving the winter garden and packing up her things and moving her into town? Would he be proud of you, Meredith? Would he say, Well done. Thanks for keeping your word? I don’t think so.”

“He’d understand,” Meredith said, wishing her voice were stronger.

“No. He wouldn’t, and you know it.”

“Fuck you,” Meredith said. “You have no idea how hard I tried... how much I wanted to...” Her voice broke and tears gathered in her throat. “Fuck you,” she said again, whispering it this time. She spun around and practically ran for the front door, noticing that the goulash was burning as she yanked the door open and went outside.

In her car, she slammed the door shut and clutched the steering wheel. “It’s easy to be self-righteous when you’re gone,” she muttered, starting up the car.

The drive home took less than two minutes.

The dogs greeted her exuberantly and she knelt down to pet them both, letting their enthusiasm at her return be a balm on her rattled nerves.

“Jeff?” she called out. Getting no answer, she took off her coat and poured herself a glass of wine. In the living room, she turned on the gas fireplace and sat on the marble hearth, letting the real heat from a fake fire warm her back.

For years she’d tried to love her mother in the same unconditional way she had loved her father. That desire to love—and be loved—was the cornerstone of her youth, and its first true failure.

Nothing she’d done had ever been right in her mother’s eyes, and for a girl who desperately wanted to please, this failure had left scars. The worst of them—besides the night of the Christmas play—had come on a sunny spring day.

Meredith didn’t recall how old she was exactly, but Nina had just started her swimming lessons, so maybe ten, and Dad had taken her sister to the pool, so Meredith was alone with Mom in that big, rambling house. She’d snuck out after lunch, with tools in her hand and a packet of seeds in her pocket. Alone in the winter garden, humming with excitement, she’d pulled out all the ivy that grew over everything and dragged away the old verdigris copper column that gave the garden a jumbled, messy look. Attacking the muddy black earth with her trowel, she’d carefully planted flower seeds in neat and tidy rows. She could picture how they would grow and bloom, how they’d give a bright and pretty order to the messy green and white so-called garden.

She’d been pleased with herself for coming up with the idea and executing it so well. As she worked the dirt and divided up the seeds and carefully placed them in the ground, she imagined her mother coming out here, seeing this gift, and—finally—hugging her.

So intent was she on the dream that she didn’t hear the house door slam shut or footsteps on the stepping-stones. The first notice she’d had that she wasn’t alone was when Mom yanked her to her feet so hard and fast that Meredith stumbled and fell sideways.

What have you done to my garden?

I wanted to make it pretty for you. I—

Meredith would never forget the look on her mother’s face as she dragged her across the yard and up the porch steps. All the way into the house, Meredith was crying, saying she was sorry, asking what she’d done that was so bad, but her mother said nothing, just pushed her into the house and slammed the door shut.

Meredith stood at the dining room window after that, crying, watching her mother attack the dirt, throwing the seeds away as if they held some kind of poison. Mom worked like a mad person, in a frenzy; she brought all the ivy back, cradling it in her hands with a gentleness she’d never shown her children, and when that was all returned to its place, she went for the column, dragging it back, muscling it into its place. When the winter garden looked as it had, she dropped to her knees in front of the column and stayed there all afternoon, with her head bowed as if in prayer. She was still there when night fell and rain started.

When she finally came back into the house, her hands black with dirt, her fingers bleeding, her face streaked by mud and rain, she didn’t even look at Meredith, just walked up the stairs and closed her bedroom door.

They never spoke of that day again. And when Dad came home, Meredith threw herself into his arms and cried until he said, What is it, Meredoodle?

Maybe if she’d said something, told him the truth, it would have changed things, changed her, but she couldn’t do it. I just love you, Daddy, she’d said, and his booming laugh had grounded her once again.

And I love you, he’d said. She wanted that to be enough, prayed for it to be enough, but it wasn’t, and she felt her own sense of failure blossom, take over, until all she could do was try to stop loving her mother.

She closed her eyes, rocking just a little. Nina was wrong. Dad would understand....

A thump sounded nearby, and she looked up, expecting to see Luke or Leia in the room, tail thumping a quiet greeting, begging for a little attention.

Jeff stood in the doorway, still dressed in the worn Levi’s and blue crew-neck sweater he’d put on yesterday morning.

“Oh. You’re home.”

“I’m going,” he said quietly.

She didn’t know whether to be relieved or disappointed that they wouldn’t be together tonight. “Do you want me to hold dinner?”

He took a deep breath and said, “I’m leaving.”

“I heard you. I don’t—” It sunk in suddenly and she looked up. “Leaving? Me? Because of last night? I’m sorry about that. Really. I shouldn’t have—”

“We need some time apart, Mere.”

“Don’t do this,” she whispered, shaking her head. “Not now.”

“There’s never a good time. I waited because of your father, and then because of your mother. I told myself you still loved me, that you were just busy and overwhelmed, but... I just don’t believe it anymore. There’s a wall around you, Mere, and I’m tired of trying to climb it.”

“It’ll be better now. In June—”

“No more waiting,” he said. “We only have a few weeks before the girls come home. Let’s use the time to figure out what the hell we want.”

She felt herself falling apart but the thought of giving in to that scared her to death. For months now she’d been burying her emotions and God knew what would happen if she ever stopped. If she let herself cry she might wail like a banshee and turn to stone like one of her mother’s fairy-tale characters. So she held it together and nodded, said in as even a voice as she could muster, “Okay.”

She saw the way he looked at her then, the disappointment, the resignation. His gaze said, Of course that’s what you’d say. It hurt her almost more than she could stand, letting him go, but she didn’t know how to stop him, what to say, so she stood up and walked past him, past the suitcase at the front door (the thump she’d heard) and went into the kitchen.

Her heart was actually missing beats as she stood at the sink, staring at nothing. It was hard to catch her breath. Never in all their years of marriage had it occurred to her that Jeff would leave her. Not even last night when he’d let her sleep alone. She’d known he wasn’t happy—and neither was she, really—but that seemed separate somehow, an ordinary bad patch.

But this...

He came up behind her. “Do you still love me, Mere?” he asked quietly, turning her by the shoulders until they were facing each other.

She wished he’d asked her that an hour ago, or yesterday, or last week. Anytime except now, when even the ground beneath her felt unreliable. She’d thought his love was a bulkhead that could hold back any storm, but like everything else in her life, his love was conditional. All at once she was that ten-year-old girl again, being dragged out of the garden, wondering how she’d gone so wrong.

He let go of her and started for the door.

Meredith almost called out for him, almost said, Of course I love you. Do you love me? but she couldn’t make her mouth open. She knew she should grab the suitcase from him or throw her arms around him. Something. But she just stood there, dry-eyed and uncomprehending, staring at his back.

At the last minute, he turned to look at her. “You’re like her, you know that, don’t you?”

“Don’t say that.”

He stared at her a moment longer, and she knew it was an opening, a chance he was giving her, but she couldn’t take it, couldn’t make herself move or reach out or even cry.

“Good-bye, Mere,” he finally said.

She stood there a long time, was still there, at her sink, staring out at the dark nothingness of her yard, long after he’d driven away.

You’re like her, he’d said.

It hurt so much she couldn’t stand it, as he must have known it would.

“He’ll be back,” she said to no one except herself. “Couples take breaks sometimes. It will all be okay.” She had to figure out how to fix it, what needed to be done. She went to the closet and grabbed the vacuum and dragged it into the living room and turned it on. The sound drowned out the voices in her head and the erratic beating of her heart.