Chapter 3

Mark stared at the open suitcase as if it belonged to someone else.

“You saw a few drawings and decided our marriage was over?”

“The drawings didn’t create the problem. They showed me how long it had been there.”

“It’s a sketchbook, Claire. Emma was upset when she drew those things.”

“She was upset when they happened.”

Mark stepped into the bedroom and lowered his voice.

“Lisa arrived yesterday. Nobody said Emma was losing her room forever. You’re packing passports because she has to sleep on the couch for a few nights.”

“How many nights?”

“I already told you—I don’t know.”

I placed Emma’s medical records inside the suitcase.

“Give me one week,” he said.

“What happens in one week?”

“Lisa may have a better idea of what she’s doing. Mason will have time to settle down. We can all discuss the sleeping arrangements when nobody is angry.”

“So Emma gives up her room now, and everyone else decides later whether she gets it back.”

“You make it sound like I threw her out of the house.”

“You removed her bed and put her belongings in boxes.”

“Mason just lost his home. Emma still has her school, her friends, and both her parents. She has more stability than he does.”

“His pain doesn’t make her room yours to give away.”

Mark rubbed both hands over his face.

“I’m trying to help my sister through the worst week of her life.”

“And you’re using our daughter to do it.”

“I’m asking Emma to make one small sacrifice.”

“It stopped being one sacrifice thirty-one sacrifices ago.”

A movement at the bedroom door made us turn.

Emma stood there with her sketchbook against her chest.

Mark’s expression softened.

“Emma, nobody wants you to feel unwanted. Mason needs somewhere private while his mother works things out. You understand why he needs the room, don’t you?”

Emma looked at him.

Then she looked at me.

I did not nod. I did not explain that Mason was frightened or that Lisa had nowhere prepared for them. I did not tell her that arguing would make everything harder.

“You can tell him what you want,” I said. “You don’t have to protect either of us.”

Her fingers tightened around the sketchbook.

“I don’t want to give him my room.”

Mark went still.

“You said it was okay yesterday.”

“I said I understood.”

“That means the same thing.”

“No, it doesn’t.”

He looked at me.

“She was fine until you made this into a crisis.”

“She wasn’t fine. She was quiet. I taught myself to confuse the two.”

“You’re putting words in her mouth.”

“Mom didn’t tell me to say no,” Emma said.

“Then why are you saying it now?”

Her voice was barely above a whisper.

“Because she finally said I could.”

Mark opened his mouth, but Emma had already turned away.

I closed the suitcase and carried it downstairs.

Emma followed with her backpack, sketchbook, and plastic bathroom basket. Her pillow remained beside the couch. The rest of her clothes stayed in the hallway boxes.

We were not taking everything.

We were taking what we needed to stop waiting.

Lisa stood near the kitchen with a coffee mug in both hands.

“Claire, I never meant for this to happen,” she said. “Mason and I can leave if we’re causing this much trouble.”

“You’re not taking him anywhere tonight,” Mark said. “Claire needs time to calm down.”

He looked at me.

“Take one night. We’ll talk tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow won’t make what happened smaller.”

“You’re going to come back and realize this was too much.”

I put on my coat and handed Emma hers.

Mark did not try to stop us. He still believed the open suitcase was a warning and the coats were part of the performance.

Emma slipped her arms into her coat. As I reached for the front door, she opened her sketchbook.

Page thirty-three was blank.

“What do I draw for number thirty-three?”

“Nothing.”

She looked past me at her mattress in the hallway.

“What if we come back and nothing changes?”

I opened the front door.

“You won’t have to draw a thirty-third.”