Page 121 of Hushed

I’ll go, and I’ll be gracious, and some hopeful animal in me will still be waiting patiently for them to say that I did nothing wrong.

If the ending were in doubt I would tell my husband. He is very good at fighting and I would hand him the fight with both hands. But there is no fight in a payroll field.

And I know exactly what he would do with it. He would take it apart the way he took the transcript apart. He would be right, and he would be loud. And he wouldn’t be able to prevent what has already been decided in my absence.

I fold the letter from Fairhaven flat and small and bury it in a stack of mail.

The letter from the publisher is still on the table from Tuesday. I put the envelope down first, facedown, and the publisher’s letter on top of it, and then the electric bill, and then the flyer for the smoothie place, and then the sudoku book with the pen still clipped to the cover. I square the edges with both hands until it looks like mail.

It looks like the kitchen table of a man who has his affairs in order.

Chapter forty-two

Levi

“Are those for me?” Bastien says as he accepts the carnations.

“Well, they were originally for Mildred Shumway, according to the gravestone, but I don’t think she wants them anymore.”

He looks at the flowers in horror.

He holds them away from himself and looks at the door.

“I’m just kidding. They were three dollars at the cash register. I couldn’t resist.”

He takes them gingerly. Outside, a band of rain hits the windows, but in here we are safe. He kisses me reluctantly. “You shouldn’t have. Really.”

“Baby boy, nobody loses a trailer over a bunch of carnations.”

He gets up and starts opening cupboards looking for something to put them in. We don’t own a vase, so it ends up being the plastic measuring jug. He stands it in the middle of the table on top of the mail.

“Any mail come in?” I ask.

“Fairhaven Electric.”

“I’ll handle it.” I set the envelope aside.

I get a glass of water I don’t really want while he’s trying to make the baby’s breath lie in exactly the right way. I lean against the counter.

“Baby boy, what’s the Kirkfield Foundation?”

He goes still, in the middle of straightening the flowers. Not dramatically. He simply stops, with two stems in his fingers. Something crosses his face fast and then he says, “Oh. Oh, fuck.” He puts the stems down and drags both hands over his face. “I have to call them and cancel. They need a count for the dinner, I said yes to that weeks ago and it went completely out of my head.” He taps his forehead with the pads of his fingers.

“Cancel what, exactly?”

“It’s a foundation thing. They do a research grant, there’s a gala, black tie, the whole production. I put in for it in August.” He is already patting his pockets for his phone. “It doesn’t matter. I’ll tell them something came up.”

“Put in for it,” I repeat. “That all?”

“Everyone puts in for it. It doesn’t mean anything.”

And there it is. Not a lie, because he is too careful for a lie. It’s a door closed so smoothly you would never hear the latch.

“Bastien.” I set the glass down. “You’re a finalist.”

He goes still again. “Who told you that?”

“Two old ladies on a porch in the Historic District.” I count it off on my fingers because if I do not do something with my hands I am going to say it louder than I want to. “Who have known for a week. Who congratulated me for you. This is how I found out from them that my husband is a finalist for fifty thousand dollars.” I put the third finger down. “They worked out inside about four seconds that I didn’t know, and were kind enough not to say so.”