That's the only thing I need it to be. Another silence. Then tell me about her. So he did. He sat in the parking lot of his son's school and told Kesha about Clare.
Not everything. Not the letter, not the most private parts, but the shape of her. The way she asked questions and listened to the answers. The way she had stood at her front door and told Ryan Whitmore to leave with a calm that more took more strength than shouting ever would. The way she laughed at her late husband's terrible cooking like it was a gift she was still grateful for.
The way she held his hand at the kitchen table the night the letter finally opened. Kesha was quiet through all of it. When he finished, she said, "She sounds like someone who's been through enough to know what actually matters." Yeah, Marcus said. She does.
Okay, Kesha said that was all just okay. Marcus got out of the van and went into the school gym and found Darius on the court warming up and his son looked up and found him in the stands immediately, the way kids always know when the specific parent they need is in the room. And gave him a single nod. Marcus nodded back. He sat in the bleachers and watched his son play basketball and thought about Kesha's question, "Do you love her?"
And the answer he hadn't given and whether not giving it was honest or just afraid. He decided it was probably both. Darius's team won by six. On the way home, Darius was running hot on adrenaline and talked the entire drive, recapping every key play, and Marcus let him talk and responded in all the right places and was genuinely happy about the win and also was thinking about something else in the background the whole time. When they pulled into the driveway, the porch light next door was on, but Clare's car wasn't there.
Marcus noticed the absence of the car before he noticed anything else, which told him something about himself, he didn't have time to sit with because Darius was already out of the car and heading for the door. He went inside, made dinner, checked his phone. No texts from Clare, he didn't text her either. But at 8:15, headlights swept across his living room window, her car pulling in, and Marcus became aware that he had at some point positioned himself on the couch with a direct line of sight to that window. He stood up and went to the kitchen.
He was very deliberately making himself a drink of water when his phone buzzed. Clare, sorry, long day. Ran some errands. How was the game? Marcus Darius scored 12.
We won, Clare. Tell him I said congratulations. Marcus looked at the phone. Typed. You could tell him yourself.
A pause. Then is that an invitation? He stared at the question. Typed if you want it to be. Another pause.
Longer this time. Then give me 10 minutes. He put the phone down on the counter. Told himself to stop smiling. Didn't stop.