Chapter 11: The Glass Box

"What does that mean?" Bancroft said from the floor.

Odile didn't look at him.

"Ask your wife what she thinks she knows about the first one," she said. "And then ask yourself why I never told you the rest."

"Mother?"

"Sit down, Bancroft. You're embarrassing the family."

She sat down herself, took up her spoon and went on with her soup.

The aunt at the end of the table started to cry.

I picked up the empty gray box and walked out, and nobody stopped me.

Sam was waiting in the hall with his coat already on and the front door open.

He took the box from my arms without a word.

In the car, I put my forehead against the cold glass of the window and shook for about two blocks.

He drove with one hand and laid the other palm up on the console between us.

I did not take it.

I looked at it for a long time, and then I put my own hand beside it, not touching, an inch away.

He didn't move his hand.

Neither of us said anything about it.

At my friend's house, he walked me to the porch and stopped on the bottom step so that his eyes were level with mine.

"Eat something tonight," he said. "Drink water. Call me if anything hurts, no matter what time."

"Is that doctor's orders?"

"Yes," he said, and his voice was rough.

I watched him go down the walk and get into his car, and I realized I was standing there with my hand curled around the place where his had not been.

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