The calls from Clare started becoming a regular thing without either of them naming it as a regular thing. It happened the way things happen when they're genuine. Not because someone decided it should happen, but because it kept happening naturally, and neither person found a reason to stop it. Tuesday evenings usually, sometimes Wednesday morning before her day started, 20 minutes, sometimes 40, just talking. She was navigating her own version of starting over.
She'd moved out of the apartment two blocks from Viven's office and into a smaller place in a neighborhood she'd chosen herself, which she described to Marcus as being quieter and less convenient and completely hers. "What does it look like? " he asked one Tuesday. "Small," she said. "Very small. One bedroom.
The kitchen is fine. The bathroom is," she paused. "Functional. Let's say functional. You're not used to small. " No.
A beat. But I'm sleeping better than I have in 5 years, which I did not expect. Why not? Because I thought the anxiety would be worse when I didn't have the financial cushion. But it's the opposite.
It's like she thought about it. It's like the anxiety before was about not knowing what I actually wanted. And now I know what I want. I just don't have it yet. And somehow that's easier.
Marcus turned that over. Having the right problem is better than having the wrong answer. A pause. That's exactly it, she said. That's exactly what it is.
She'd started working 3 days a week at a community nonprofit downtown entry level. Nothing like the position at her grandmother's company paperwork and database entry and sitting in on intake meetings for young adults in housing transition. She'd volunteered first, then they'd offered her a part-time stipend, and she'd taken it with a kind of quiet pride that Marcus could hear in her voice when she mentioned it. My grandmother called. She told him one Wednesday.
Marcus waited. She called to tell me she'd heard I was working at the nonprofit. She didn't say how she knew. She probably made it her business to know, Marcus said. That's what I thought.
A pause. She didn't tell me to come back. She didn't say anything about the arrangement or Andrew or any of it. She just said Claire's voice changed slightly, carrying the weight of something she was still processing. She said, "I hope you're eating properly. " That was it.
"I hope you're eating properly," Marcus was quiet. "What does that mean? " Clare asked. "It means she misses you," Marcus said. "And she doesn't have the language for it yet. She's had 70 years to develop language. " Doesn't matter.