Chapter 4: The Tuesday Appointment

On Tuesday at five fifty-eight, I sat in a counselor's waiting room in Midtown with my coat still on.

Stewart had picked the office.

He had picked the day, the hour, and the length: fifty minutes, six to six-fifty.

He sat across from me in the same charcoal suit, his phone in his hand, and he looked at it twice before the door opened.

"Before we go in," I said, "I have one rule."

"I'm listening."

"You get what I give, and I don't count."

He frowned.

"Count what?"

"Anything. Minutes, hours, how long I stayed or how long I didn't. If you say a number about me, I walk out."

"That's a significant restriction."

"It's the only one."

He thought about it the way he thought about a contract.

"Fine," he said. "I won't count."

"And the phone goes face down."

He hesitated.

Then he set it on the arm of his chair, screen against the wood.

The counselor was a gray-haired woman with a notebook, and she told us to sit wherever we liked.

I took the couch.

Stewart took the armchair opposite and put his phone on the small table between us.

"Why are you here?" she asked.

"Because my wife left me at a dinner," Stewart said. "And I would like to understand what I did."

"What did you do?" she asked me.

"He told a table of twelve people how many minutes I had left to be his wife," I said. "And then he looked at his watch while I left."

"I was checking whether she was right about the number," Stewart said.

"Were you?"

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