Traded for Nine Boats, I Walked In Pregnant and Ran Their House novel · Chapter 15 of 24

Chapter 15: The Chair

The fifth night, I went up.

He had left his door open every night, exactly as he said he would.

Every night I lay in the pledge room under the icon and listened to it stay open.

A brown box had come that afternoon from a shop on Steinway Street.

I had ordered it in a bad hour.

Marigo signed for it at the door and handed it to me at supper without a flicker.

"For your back," she said.

I slid it under the brass bed and did not open it.

At midnight I stopped pretending to read.

I put on his gray T-shirt, which I had never given back, and climbed the stairs in my bare feet.

Alex was in the leather armchair by his window, with the lamp off and the street light on his shoulders.

He was dressed, and he was awake, and he did not get up.

"I said I'd leave it open," he said.

"I know," I said.

"I didn't think you'd come."

"Neither did I," I said.

I stood in front of him with my arms at my sides.

"She moved," I said.

He went still.

"The morning on the landing, with my foot on your hand.

"I felt her turn over.

"I didn't tell you."

"You didn't tell me," he said slowly.

"I'm telling you now."

His throat worked.

He did not ask what I wanted.

He only looked at me, and I saw how much it cost him to stay in the chair.

"Put your hands on the arms," I said.

He put his hands on the arms of the chair.

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