Chapter 23: Terms

The house on Maple Court was not empty anymore, and it was not full.

An oak table stood in the kitchen with four chairs around it.

The glider sat in the nursery by the window, with the blue-shaded lamp beside it, and the pale rectangle in the carpet stayed empty.

Upstairs, the walnut bed frame was put together and made up with one sheet and Gran's quilt.

Kate had dropped the quilt off that morning with a note pinned to it: DON'T LET HIM LOSE THIS.

"I wasn't sure which side," Daniel said, in the bedroom doorway.

"Which side what?"

"Which side you'd want. I haven't slept in it. I wanted you to pick."

I looked at him, standing in his own house with his hands in his back pockets, waiting for my verdict on a bed.

"Left," I said.

"Left," he said, and nodded, and looked relieved.

We ate cold chicken at the oak table. Neither of us had eaten at church.

I took a notecard out of my bag, one of Kate's florist cards, and the same black marker I had used at her flat.

"What's that?"

"Terms," I said.

He put down his fork.

I wrote in block capitals, slowly, with the card flat on the oak.

LYDIA LIVES AT MAPLE COURT BECAUSE SHE CHOSE IT.

LYDIA KEEPS HER NAME. THE MAILBOX SAYS QUINN AND FERRIS.

EVERY BIG DECISION IS MADE AT THIS TABLE. NOBODY CALLS THEIR MOTHER FIRST.

JUDITH: THURSDAYS, THIRTY MINUTES, THIS KITCHEN. LYDIA IS IN THE ROOM. NO KEY.

RORY: SUNDAYS. ANY TIME HE WANTS.

When I was done I turned the card around and slid it across the wood.

He read it twice.

"Can I add one?" he said.