Chapter 14: Hope

Elias drove us to the lake house himself, with the heater on high and both hands tight on the wheel.

It was Saturday, the second week of December, and the road north of Saugatuck was white on both sides.

He had not said ten words since Chicago.

"You're doing it again," I said.

"Doing what?"

"Holding your breath when I look at you."

He glanced over, and back at the road.

"I'm being careful."

"You've been careful for a week."

His jaw moved.

He turned in at a gravel drive between two bare oaks.

The house at the end of it was low and gray, with a porch that faced the water.

His grandmother had bought it when he was thirteen, he told me, the first summer he slept through a whole night.

Inside, it smelled of cedar and cold ashes.

He lit the stove and carried in the bags.

I stood at the glass doors and watched the lake throw itself at the beach.

Winston's message had come in on the highway, and I'd turned the phone face down.

It said: I'm not asking you to answer. I just wanted you to know I'm sorry.

I had not answered.

Elias came and stood behind me, and he didn't touch me.

"Say it," I said.

"Say what?"

"Whatever you've been rehearsing since the clinic."

He was quiet for a while.

"I was not afraid of the surgery," he said. "I was afraid of this."

"Of what?"

"Wanting something, and you looking at me across a kitchen with those eyes when it doesn't come."

"Three percent," I said.

"Three percent."

"Elias." I turned around. "I've been protected for six years."

"By whom?"

"Cordelia protected me from the dinner table. Winston protected me from the bad news."

I took a breath.

"Everyone protected me from my own life, and they all had a reason."

"I'm not them."

"You are when you hold your breath."

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