8. Audrey
— ? —
Audrey
The insurance adjuster has a clipboard and a practiced frown, like he’s seen a hundred families standing in the wreckage of their lives.
“The claim is processing,” he says, “but these things take time. Three to six months, minimum. Possibly longer, depending on the investigation.”
“Investigation?”
“Standard procedure for fire damage.” He checks something on his clipboard. “In the meantime, you’ll need to find temporary housing. We can provide a per diem for hotel costs, but it’s limited.”
I stare at him. Three to six months. No house. No savings that aren’t tied up in the property we no longer have. Lily starting third grade next week at a school she’ll have to commute to from wherever we end up.
“What about the rental on Birch Street?” Ruth’s voice cuts through my spiral. “The Hendersons’ old place. It’s been empty for months - I’m sure they’d be willing to work something out.”
The adjuster shrugs. “That’s between you and the owners. We just cut the checks.”
He leaves. I keep staring at the charred skeleton of our cottage, the blackened beams and shattered windows and the scorched outline of what used to be our life.
“Audrey.” Ruth’s hand on my arm. “We need to make a decision.”
“I know.”
“The rental is two bedrooms. It’s small, but it’s furnished. You and Lily could-”
“We’ll take it.”
The we comes out before I can stop it.
Ruth drives me to see the place that afternoon, and I understand immediately why it’s been empty for months.
The Henderson rental is tiny - barely eight hundred square feet, tucked between a hardware store and an empty lot. Two small bedrooms, one bathroom, a kitchen the size of a closet. The walls are thin enough that I can hear traffic from the street.
“It’s temporary,” Ruth says, reading my face.
“Right.”
“Lily can have one bedroom. You can have the other. Rowan-”
“Can sleep at your place.”
Ruth is quiet for a moment. “Is that what you want?”
I look around the cramped space. The pullout couch in the living room. The water-stained ceiling. The window that rattles in its frame.
“It’s a two-bedroom,” I say slowly. “Where would Lily sleep if I take one room and Rowan’s not here at all?”
“The couch. He could sleep on the couch when he visits.”
“And explain to our eight-year-old that Daddy lives with Grandma now? In the middle of everything else?”
Ruth doesn’t answer. She doesn’t have to. We both know what I’m saying.
“Lily needs stability,” I finally say. “Both of us, in one place, even if it’s complicated. We can figure out the rest later.”
“Are you sure?”
No. I’m not sure of anything.
“He’s on the couch,” I say firmly. “He gets the living room. I get the bedroom. And we don’t talk about-” I wave my hand vaguely. “Any of it. Not until I’m ready.”
“That’s fair.”
“Is it?” I sink onto the thin mattress of what will be my new bed. “I don’t know what’s fair anymore. I don’t know what I’m doing.”
Ruth sits beside me, takes my hand in hers. “You’re surviving. That’s enough for now.”
Surviving. Is that what this is?
I guess it has to be.
We move in three days later.
Rowan arrives with a duffel bag and an expression like a man walking to his own execution. His hands are still bandaged - thick white gauze wrapped around his palms and forearms - and I notice he keeps them at his sides, careful not to draw attention.
“I put the air mattress in Lily’s room,” he says quietly. “In case she wants company the first few nights.”
“Good. Thank you.”
We stand in the cramped living room, two feet of space between us, and the silence feels like a physical weight.
“I know this is-” He stops, swallows hard. “I know you don’t want me here.”
“It’s not about what I want.”
“Audrey-”
“Lily needs both of us. So we’re both here. That’s all this is.”
He nods. His jaw is tight, his eyes red-rimmed like he hasn’t been sleeping. Good. Let him suffer. Let him feel an ounce of what he’s put me through.
Except it’s not good. Except seeing him hurt doesn’t make me feel better. It just makes everything worse.
“I’ll stay out of your way,” he says.
“That would be best.”
He turns toward the pullout couch - his new bed, three feet from the kitchen, directly in my path to anywhere in this tiny apartment.
This is going to be impossible.
The first night is chaos.
Lily’s room is too small for her bed and the air mattress, so she ends up sleeping with me. Rowan camps out on the pullout, which squeaks every time he moves. The bathroom pipes rattle when anyone flushes. The walls are so thin I can hear him breathing.
At 2 AM, I give up on sleep and pad to the kitchen for water.
He’s awake.
I can see him in the darkness, sitting on the edge of the couch with his head in his bandaged hands. His shoulders are shaking.
He’s crying.
I should walk away. Get my water and go back to bed and leave him to his misery. This is the man who broke our marriage. He doesn’t deserve my sympathy.
But I can’t move.
I stand in the doorway, watching him fall apart in the silence, and something in my chest cracks open against my will.
“Rowan?”
He looks up. Even in the dim light from the street, I can see the tears on his face.
“Sorry.” His voice is rough. “Did I wake you?”
“I couldn’t sleep.”
“Yeah.” He wipes his face with the back of his hand. “Me neither.”
I should go back to bed. I should.
Instead, I cross to the kitchen, fill two glasses with water, and walk over to the couch.
“Here.”
He takes the glass. Our fingers don’t touch - I make sure of that - but I sit down on the far end of the couch anyway, leaving three feet of space between us.
“I keep thinking about the fire,” he says after a long moment. “If I hadn’t been at Mom’s. If I’d been home-”
“You would have gotten us out.”
“Would I? Or would I have been-” He stops, clenches his jaw. “Would I have been distracted?”
He’s asking if he would have been texting her. If he would have missed the smoke because he was busy building something with someone else.
“I don’t know,” I say honestly.
“That’s what keeps me up.” He sets the glass down, stares at his bandaged hands. “The not knowing. All the ways I could have lost you.”
“You ran in. Twice. That has to count for something.”
He looks up at me, something raw and desperate in his eyes. “Does it?”
I don’t have an answer. I’m not ready to forgive him. I don’t know if I’ll ever be ready.
But I’m sitting here, at 2 AM, sharing space with him for the first time since I threw him out.
That has to count for something too.
“Get some sleep,” I say finally, standing up. “Lily’s going to want waffles in the morning.”
“Audrey-”
“Goodnight, Rowan.”
I walk back to my room without looking at him. But at the doorway, I pause.
“Thank you,” I say quietly. “For Mr. Buttons. For running in.”
I close the door before he can respond.
The next morning, I wake to voices in the kitchen.
Lily’s laugh - bright and clear, cutting through the thin walls. And Rowan’s voice, low and warm, saying something I can’t quite make out.
I press my ear to the door.
“Daddy, are you and Mommy still married?”
My heart stops.
“We’re figuring things out, baby girl.” His voice cracks slightly. “But I love your mom. That hasn’t changed.”
“Do you promise?”
“I promise. I love her more than anything in the world. I just-” He pauses, and I can hear him struggling for words. “Sometimes grown-ups make mistakes. Big ones. And then they have to work really hard to fix them.”
“Are you working hard?”
“I’m trying, Lily. I’m trying so hard.”
“Okay.” She sounds satisfied. “Can I have chocolate chips in my waffles?”
“Sure, baby.”
I lean my forehead against the door and breathe.
I love her more than anything in the world.
He says it like it’s simple. Like love is enough to fix what he broke.
It’s not. I know it’s not.
But hearing him say it - hearing him tell our daughter that he’s trying - something small and stubborn flickers in my chest.
Maybe trying is where we start.