Chapter 4: Providence

Monday morning I was elbow-deep in a golden retriever's ear in Providence, Rhode Island.

The retriever had eaten a sock and wanted everyone to know it was not his fault.

"Hold his head," said the vet, a freckled woman with reading glasses pushed up into short red-brown hair.

"Don't let him look at me. He's guilty and he knows it."

"I've got him."

"Maggie Foley," she said, without letting go of the forceps. "You're the one who said no in the spring."

"I'm the one who said yes this week."

"Good. Don't make me ask why."

"I'm not going to tell you why."

"Even better," Maggie said, and pulled out a grey sock.

The dog barked at it.

The whole room laughed, and I laughed with them.

It felt strange in my chest. I had not laughed in days.

By noon Maggie had learned I took my coffee black.

She had learned I ran a fecal float faster than her last two techs.

She had also learned I went very still when my phone buzzed.

It buzzed eleven times that morning.

Four were from Miles.

Two were from Lydia: "Please call me. Just to know you're ok."

One was from my father: "Ate your cold pancakes. Sorry."

I turned the phone face down in the drawer.

"Ex?" Maggie asked, without looking up from her chart.

"Something like that."

"Tell me when you want to talk about it. Or don't. I'll make you a sandwich either way."

I decided I liked her very much.

That evening she drove me to the apartment in her truck, because it was raining and I had three boxes and a lamp.

The apartment was the top floor of an old house on a hill, with slanted ceilings and a narrow wooden stairwell.

Its one window looked over a row of red-brick chimneys.

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