I stood in the kitchen wearing my green velvet dress and Richard’s pearl necklace, the one he had given me on our thirtieth anniversary.
I told myself not to look at the driveway again.
Then headlights passed the front window, and I looked anyway.
They kept going.
I called Laura first.
Straight to voicemail.
I called Michael.
Voicemail again.
Fiona’s phone rang twice before she sent me away.
There are sounds that tell you more than words ever could.
A call rejected after two rings is one of them.
I went back to the dining room and sat at the head of the table.
The turkey sat uncarved.
The cider steamed less with every passing minute.
The candles burned lower.
Nine o’clock passed.
Then ten.
Then eleven.
By 12:15 a.m., the gravy had formed a skin, the cider had gone cold, and the turkey looked less like dinner than evidence.
The room had that strange quiet a house gets when it has prepared itself for people who never arrive.
A chair creaked when the heat came on.
For half a second, I thought someone had walked in.
No one had.
That was the night something inside me finally went still.
