The turkey sat uncarved.
The cider steamed less with every passing minute.
The candles burned lower.
Nine o’clock passed.
Then ten.
Then eleven.
By 12:15 a.m., the gravy had formed a skin, the cider had gone cold, and the turkey looked less like dinner than evidence.
The room had that strange quiet a house gets when it has prepared itself for people who never arrive.
A chair creaked when the heat came on.
For half a second, I thought someone had walked in.
No one had.
That was the night something inside me finally went still.
Not broken.
Clear.
Richard had been dead for ten years.
He died on an ordinary morning in our bathroom while tying his necktie for work.
One moment he was asking if I had seen his brown belt.
The next, his hand was on the vanity and his knees were giving out.
The paramedics counted over his chest for so long that I started to hate the sound of numbers.
