He had learned in 26 months that Isabel processed things the way deep water moves slow on the surface, much faster underneath, and you never pushed it. Finally, she said, "What did come after? " He looked at her. "Say it," she said. "Out loud, in this kitchen, not in front of an officer, not for the record. Just say it. " He was quiet for a moment.
Then, "Something real. " She exhaled, a long, shaky breath that she'd been holding without knowing it. "Something real," she repeated. "Yeah. " She nodded once. Slowly, like she was making peace with something she had been arguing against for a long time. Outside, another bus went past.
Inside, the refrigerator hummed. The coffee in both their mugs had gone completely cold. "Nadia comes home at 3:00," she said. "I know. " "And you have a shoot. " "At noon. I'll be back by 2:30. " "Okay. " She stood.
She was still wearing his robe. She looked down at it and then back at him with something in her expression that was almost humor. "I should probably give this back. " He shook his head. "Keep it. " She paused. "I mean it," he said.
"Keep it. " She looked at him for another moment, and then she walked down the hall toward her room. Her room in his apartment and the life they had built without meaning to. And she didn't look back. He sat at the kitchen table with two cold mugs and a clean floor and the knowledge that something had finally been said out loud that had been true for a long time and the world had not fallen apart. Not yet.
He looked at the clock on the microwave. He had 45 minutes before he needed to leave for the shoot. He picked up his phone. There was a new email in his inbox. He saw the subject line and his stomach dropped three floors.
US Citizenship and Immigration Services Notification of Interview Date Change. He opened it. The interview had been moved up. Not 31 days away, 14 days, two weeks. He set the phone face down on the table.
Sat very still for a moment. Then he picked it up again, read the email again, confirmed that it said what he thought it said, and then he put it down again and looked at the hallway where Isabel had just disappeared. He should tell her now. He stood up, walked to her door, raised his hand to knock. Then he heard it.
Through the door. Very quiet. The sound of her crying. Not the dissolving kind he'd heard that first night in October two years ago. Something softer than that.
More private. The kind of crying a person does when something they have been protecting themselves against finally gets through the armor. He stood at the door with his knuckles raised and he did not knock. He stood there for a moment. The way he had stood outside this same door on a midnight in October wanting nothing more than to let her know someone was there without making it into something she had to respond to.