Chapter 1

My phone was still on the video Leah had posted twenty minutes earlier.

In it, my husband stood in the middle of a terrace, a glass in his hand, leaning down slightly to listen to her.

She laughed and touched his arm. He smiled, too.

The caption read: Welcome back, the real Nathan.

I watched it twice, then set my phone facedown on the table.

The door opened, and Nathan came in.

He tossed his jacket over the back of a chair and kicked off his shoes.

One lay across the hallway, the other just beyond the entryway rug.

"Anything left to eat?"

"There's chicken in the fridge."

He lifted the lid of the container and glanced inside.

"Chicken again?"

"You didn't say you'd be home for dinner."

He shut the fridge and looked at me.

I knew that expression.

For the past two years and eight months, whenever the pain made him irritable or something didn't go his way, his lips would press together like that.

I unplugged the iron.

"Two minutes in the microwave should do it."

He stood there for a moment, then finally put the plate in himself.

This was his third week back at work.

His doctor had cleared him to drive and use the stairs, and encouraged him to gradually take on everyday tasks again.

After he ate, he left his plate beside the couch.

"Could you put that in the dishwasher?" I said. "And put your shoes away."

He turned to look at me.

"I was on my feet for three hours today, Claire."

"I know. I saw Leah's video."

His expression changed.

"So now you're keeping tabs on what I do when I'm out?"

"No. It's just that the doctor said—"

"I know what the doctor said."

He braced his hands on his knees and stood, leaving the plate where it was.

"Do you think just because I'm back at work, I'm supposed to pay you back for everything right away?"

The shirt I'd ironed lay draped over my hand, its cuffs still warm.

"I just asked you to put your plate away."

He stared at me for a few seconds, then picked up his phone and headed upstairs.

At the foot of the stairs, he stopped.

"I'm wearing the blue one tomorrow. Don't bother ironing the white one."

I looked down at the white shirt in my hands.

"The blue one's in the dryer."

"Then take it out."

He said it as though it went without saying.

Upstairs, the bedroom door closed.

Two years and eight months earlier, I'd given him his first sponge bath in the hospital.

He'd been trembling with pain, holding my wrist and telling me he was sorry.

Then came the second surgery, and the third.

The walker, the shower chair, the pill organizer beside the bed.

The alarms on my phone that went off every few hours.

I went from being a project manager to picking up the occasional freelance assignment, shoved my work suitcase under the bed, and moved my desk just outside the bedroom so I could hear him call for me.

The first time he walked to the corner on his own, I cried harder than he did.

I thought the worst was behind us.

The next morning, Nathan came downstairs in the blue shirt.

He'd taken it out of the dryer himself. The collar curled a little at the edges.

I was sitting at the table, looking up tickets.

"I'd like to visit Dad the first weekend of next month."

He switched on the coffee maker.

"Why all of a sudden?"

"It's not all of a sudden. I said I'd go ages ago."

There had been tests he needed, and at Christmas, he hadn't wanted to spend hours traveling.

This spring, he'd said he was just starting to step up his rehab and wasn't used to having me away.

Every time, Dad had said it was okay.

When we'd spoken on the phone two days earlier, he'd asked if I could come stay for a couple of nights once Nathan was doing a little better.

He hadn't seen me in eleven months.

"Now's not a good time," Nathan said.

"You don't have any follow-up appointments that week. I checked the calendar."

"I mean money."

I angled my laptop toward him.

"A hundred and eighty-six dollars round trip. I'd stay with Dad."

He didn't look at the screen.

"We still have a mortgage and all those bills. Do you really need to spend that much money just to sit around and chat for two days?"

"I could use what I made on last month's project."

He picked up his coffee.

"Since when did we start dividing things into your money and my money?"

I slowly turned the laptop back toward me.

His phone lit up.

Leah's name appeared on the screen. He read the message, and the corner of his mouth twitched.

"I'm going to be late. Stop by the tailor's for me today. My order's ready."

"What order?"