me before asking whether I had remembered that she disliked the bakery’s wooden forks.
I had brought metal ones.
It was not enough to make a relationship work.
It was somewhere useful to begin.
A few weeks later, the list hung framed in Elise’s hallway beside the new photograph from the library wall. We had left the crossed-out initials visible. Neither of us wanted to improve the evidence by pretending we had always been brave.
On her refrigerator, our handwriting shared a calendar.
Thursday studio.
Saturday lunch with my father.
