Chapter 4

At ten the next morning, the locksmith began changing every lock on my house.

By ten thirty, Julia’s key opened nothing.

I stood in the entryway as the old dead bolt dropped into his toolbox.

“Back door too?” he asked.

“Yes. Every lock.”

The drill started again.

Each sharp burst made me flinch, but beneath the noise, something inside me finally went quiet.

When the locksmith handed me the first new key, I closed my fingers around it.

For the first time in seven years, Julia could enter my home only if I opened the door.

Ten minutes later, a key scraped against the new lock.

The handle jerked once.

Twice.

Then harder.

Only after it refused to turn did someone knock.

Julia stood on the porch with her old key in her hand.

“Why doesn’t my key work?”

“Because it isn’t your key anymore.”

Her gaze moved past me to the tools on the floor.

“You changed the locks?”

“Yes.”

“Does Ethan know?”

“He knows I asked for your key back.”

Julia’s mouth tightened.

“I left an earring in your bedroom.”

“I’ll bring it to you.”

“I know where it is.”

She stepped forward.

I stayed in the doorway.

For one suspended second, we faced each other across the threshold of my own house.

Then Julia stepped back and took out her phone.

“Claire changed the locks,” she told Ethan.

That was all it took.

Twelve minutes later, his car swung into the driveway.

Twelve minutes.

On our anniversary, twenty minutes had become more than two hours.

For Julia, twelve was enough.

Ethan left his car door open and hurried toward us.

“What happened?”

Julia lifted her useless key.

Ethan looked at me. “You actually did it.”

Behind me, the locksmith’s drill stopped.

The sudden silence made Ethan’s words sound louder.

“Yes,” I said.

“You changed the locks without telling me.”

“I told you Julia couldn’t keep walking into our home.”

Julia moved beside him.

Not behind him.

Beside him.

The position looked familiar. I had seen it in purple and yellow crayon less than twenty-four hours earlier.

“You could have talked to me,” Ethan said.

“I did.”

He had no answer to that.

His eyes dropped to the old key in Julia’s hand.

“She’s had it for years.”

“And yesterday, you chose what that meant.”

I held up my new key.

“Today, I chose what it means.”

Julia touched Ethan’s arm.

“I don’t want to come between you two.”

But she made no move to leave.

Ethan didn’t ask her to.

The locksmith returned from the kitchen carrying his drill case. His gaze passed over the three of us before he opened his palm.

Two new keys rested there.

He handed the first one to me.

“This one’s yours.”

Then he raised the second.

“And who should I give this one to?”