He Sent Me Away for Three Years. Now My Divorce Has Him Panicking. novel · Chapter 20 of 24
Chapter 20: Not That Word
Monica's POV
By the fifth Sunday he had fixed the porch rail, the sink again, a sticking window and my mother's opinion of him, which had risen from terrible to bearable.
That night I walked to the dry cleaner's with Biscuit and a foil pan of her lasagna.
The stairs smelled of starch and steam.
He opened the door in a gray T-shirt with a drill in one hand.
"Mom sent food," I said. "Don't read into it."
"I won't."
"I mean it."
"I know you do," Dalton said, and stepped back to let me in.
The room had a shelf on the wall that was nearly level.
On the refrigerator, under a magnet shaped like a taco, was a crayon drawing of a dog, a tall man and a lady with chestnut hair.
Archie had come on Saturday with his aunt and stayed two hours.
Dalton had read him the same dinosaur book four times.
"It's crooked," I said, looking at the shelf.
"It's the floor that's crooked."
"It's the shelf."
"I was going to fix it before you came."
"You didn't know I was coming."
"I hoped," he said.
I put the lasagna on the stove and turned around.
He was standing very still with the drill hanging at his side.
He had lost weight, and he'd stopped wearing the suits.
There was a tired line at the corner of his mouth that I would have known in the dark.
I thought about three years of walking past a blue sign with a white arrow.
I thought about the pen on my mother's table and the signature I hadn't touched.
"Put that down," I said.
He set the drill on the counter.
I crossed the room and put both hands flat on his chest.
His heart was going hard, just as it had in the elevator.
"This isn't forgiveness," I said.
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