Chapter 6
The downstairs windows glowed warm against the wet afternoon.
A stroller stood folded beneath the porch roof.
Adam climbed the steps with the roses still in his hand.
He rang.
Nobody answered.
He rang again.
Finally, the door opened three inches.
Elise looked at him.
Her hair was pinned up loosely, and there was a dish towel over one shoulder.
“You were supposed to text.”
“I need to see my wife.”
“She’s feeding the baby.”
“I’m the baby’s father.”
“I know.”
“Then open the door.”
Elise studied him.
“I’m not keeping you from your daughter, Adam. I’m keeping you from barging into a room where a woman recovering from major abdominal surgery is trying to nurse a three-week-old baby.”
The words hit harder than he expected.
“I just want five minutes.”
“I’ll ask her.”
The door closed.
He stood on the porch listening to the faint sound of movement inside.
A minute passed.
Then three.
Adam noticed a small white cloth draped over the stroller.
One corner was embroidered with a crooked blue N.
Marina had done that.
She had bought an embroidery kit during pregnancy and spent an entire Sunday laughing because her first attempt looked like a worm.
He remembered sitting beside her on the sofa while she practiced.
Or rather, he remembered half sitting beside her.
He had been messaging Savannah beneath a blanket.
The door opened again.
This time Marina stood there.
Adam forgot everything he had planned to say.
She looked smaller.
Not thinner in the glamorous way people sometimes said about women after pregnancy.
Smaller as though fatigue had taken up physical space inside her.
She wore black leggings, thick socks, and one of his old University of Pittsburgh sweatshirts.
Her brown hair was twisted into a loose knot.
There were shadows beneath her eyes.
And cradled against her chest in a cream sleeper was Nell.
His daughter.
Adam had not seen her in person since the morning he left.
Twenty days earlier she had looked impossibly tiny.
Now her cheeks were fuller.
One miniature fist rested against Marina’s collarbone.
“Hey,” he said.
Marina looked at the roses.
Then back at him.
“You were supposed to text.”
“I know. I just—Bernice told me.”
Marina waited.
“I didn’t realize you’d actually moved.”
“I sent you the address.”
“I thought you meant temporarily.”
“I did mean temporarily.”
Something loosened in his chest.
Then Marina added, “Until I find an apartment.”