35. Alex
ALEX
Six weeks after Preston dies, Mrs. Vance sits at our kitchen table with a red pen in one hand and today’s newspaper spread beneath the other, editing an article that has already been printed.
I should have known better than to give her a copy.
“You made me sound old.” She grumbles as she underlines another sentence.
I look up from my coffee. “You are old.”
Her eyes lift over the top of her glasses.
I reconsider my life choices.
The new cane hooked over the back of her chair is within easy reach, and while her ribs healed faster than mine did, I have personally witnessed this woman swing before thinking.
She chose a black cane this time, with a silver handle she claims makes her look distinguished.
I think it makes her look like a retired mob boss, but she seemed pleased when I told her that, so I’ve stopped mentioning it.
“You called me elderly three times,” she says, returning to the article.
“That’s a standard descriptive term for someone over eighty who has buried three husbands and walks around with a cane and a head wrap so that she doesn’t have to do her hair..”
“It’s rude.”
“It’s accurate.”
Her red pen moves again.
I shake my head and reach for my mug, careful not to disturb the stack of notes beside my laptop.
The dining table hasn’t really been a dining table for several weeks.
One end holds my work, a charger, two interview notebooks, and the envelope of documents Remy dropped off yesterday.
Ryder’s mail occupies a shrinking corner near the fruit bowl, and there’s a grocery list beneath my phone with his handwriting at the top and mine taking over halfway down.
He wrote steak, potatoes, and coffee.
I added oat milk, vanilla creamer, strawberries, sour candy, and the cereal he claims is for children but eats out of the box whenever he thinks I’m not looking.
One of my cardigans is hanging over the chair beside Mrs. Vance.
My shoes are kicked beneath the bench near the mudroom.
There’s a framed photograph of Ryder and me on the shelf where one of his old fire department awards used to sit, and sometime last week my favorite mug migrated from the drying rack to the hook beside his.
I don’t remember deciding where any of it was going to go.
It just started belonging.
Mrs. Vance makes another mark on the paper. “You also left out the part where I hit him.”
“I did not. It says you fought back when he attacked you.”
“That’s vague and doesn’t tell the whole story of my heroic self-defense.”
“You want me to specify the number of cane strikes?”
“That would be more accurate journalism.”
I smile despite myself and take a careful sip of coffee.
Decaf.
The word printed on the bag in the pantry feels louder every time I look at it, even though Ryder hasn’t noticed the switch yet. Or if he has, he hasn’t asked.
I found out yesterday morning.
Four tests are hidden in the bathroom upstairs because one apparently wasn’t convincing enough.
Neither was two. By the time the fourth showed the same result, I sat on the closed toilet lid staring at them while Ryder moved around downstairs making breakfast, completely unaware that our life had changed while he was arguing with the toaster.
I haven’t told him yet.
Not because I don’t want to.
Every time I imagine opening my mouth, the words become enormous.
I’m pregnant.
We’re having a baby.
There’s a baby.
Our baby.
I keep trying to figure out which version won’t make Ryder’s brain short-circuit and lead to twelve hours of internet research followed by the arrival of a fireproof crib.
The back door opens somewhere behind me.
I glance toward the mudroom, but Ryder doesn’t come into the kitchen. A cabinet opens, something metallic hits the workbench, and then his footsteps move away again.
He’s been strange all morning.
Not bad strange. Ryder strange. Like I’m about to open the door to a new home defense alarm or something.
He showered before eight even though he isn’t working today.
He put on dark jeans and the navy shirt I like on him instead of one of the old station T-shirts he usually wears around the house.
He disappeared into the garage after breakfast and has been carrying things through the backyard while refusing to tell me what he’s doing.
When I asked, he kissed me and told me to work on my article.
The article that’s been finished for three days.
Suspicious bastard.
Mrs. Vance folds the newspaper and pushes it toward me. Her red marks crowd the margins around my byline.
“It’s good.”
The simple words stop me.
I look at her.
She doesn’t add anything for several seconds.
Her fingers rest over the photograph that ran with the article, an exterior shot of Mason Ridge taken after investigators released the property.
No Preston. No crime scene photographs. No image of me being loaded into an ambulance or Ryder walking out of that building with blood on his hands.
Or Mrs. Vance in her dressing gown scowling at the camera.
That wasn’t the story I wanted to tell.
The story is about buildings everyone knew were dangerous and people nobody listened to until the danger became impossible to ignore.
It’s about inspection failures and ignored complaints, broken alarms and tenants who were expected to live with problems because fixing them cost money.
Preston is in it because the investigation proved how he used those failures, but his name doesn’t get to swallow everyone else’s.
Mrs. Vance taps the page. “You did right by them.”
My throat tightens enough that I have to look down at my mug. “Marcy says the city council is already panicking because you’ve got national attention on you.”
“Good.” Mrs. Vance nods.
“That was my reaction.”
Mrs. Vance smiles, and for a little while we sit there with afternoon light coming through the windows and the low sound of Ryder moving somewhere outside. It’s ordinary enough that I almost miss how much I wanted this when ordinary felt impossible.
Mrs. Vance reaches for half a muffin from the plate between us. Ryder bought them yesterday after I mentioned she was coming over. Blueberry, because he remembers everything. She tears off one corner, then pauses before eating it.
Her eyes move to my coffee.
Then to the muffin I’ve barely touched.
I know that look.
“What?”
She doesn’t answer immediately. Her attention lingers on my face long enough that I resist the urge to check whether I have something stuck to it.
“You feeling all right?”
“Yes.”
“You look tired.”
“I work for a newspaper. Fatigue is part of the benefits package along with ink stains and questionable hours.”
Mrs. Vance isn’t distracted.
She takes another look at my mug.
My stomach drops.
“No.”
Her eyebrows lift. “I didn’t say anything.”
“You’re about to.”
“I wasn’t going to ask why you’re drinking decaf.”
I stare at her. She stares back.
I knew switching coffee was going to betray me.
“I sometimes drink decaf.”
“No, you don’t. In the multiple years I was your neighbor, not once did you have that half-bean pee instead of the high octane.”
“That seems invasive.”
“You’ve been putting your hand over your stomach all afternoon but pretending like you’re not.”
My gaze drops.
My palm is resting there now.
I move it to the table.
Mrs. Vance’s expression changes before I say anything. The suspicion fades, leaving her softer than I’m used to seeing her.
I look toward the mudroom again.
No Ryder.
The house is quiet except for a faint scrape from outside and the refrigerator humming behind me.
I came into this afternoon thinking I might tell her. Maybe because telling her will be easier than telling my mother first, or because Mrs. Vance has seen me at some of the worst points in my life and somehow never treated me like surviving made me fragile.
Mostly, I think I need to hear myself say it.
“I’m pregnant.”
Mrs. Vance doesn’t gasp or start firing questions at me. Her hand simply stops halfway to her tea, and she watches me with an expression I can’t read for several seconds.
Then she puts the cup down.
“How long have you known?”
“Yesterday.”
“And Ryder?”
I shake my head.
Her gaze flicks toward the back of the house before returning to me. I brace for the lecture, but she only reaches across the table and lays her hand over mine.
“Are you happy?”
The question gets me harder than anything else could have.
I look down at our hands. Hers is smaller than I remember from all the times she grabbed mine in hallways or shoved something useful into it because she decided I needed protecting.
“Yeah.” My voice comes out rougher than I want. “I’m scared, but I’m happy. So fuckin’ happy.”
Her fingers tighten.
“Those things can live together. And when it comes to our babies, they really often do.”
I nod because speaking again might embarrass me, and I can already feel the tears in my eyes.
Mrs. Vance lets the quiet stay there until I’m the one who breaks it.
“I have a doctor’s appointment next week. I took four tests, though, so unless I somehow bought the world’s most coordinated batch of defective pregnancy tests, I think we can trust them.”
Her mouth twitches, and I know that look well enough to recognize the joke forming before she gets a chance to make it.
I swipe beneath one eye with the side of my finger and point at her with the other hand. “Don’t.”
Mrs. Vance lifts her brows, far too innocent for a woman who once tried to take on Preston with a cane. “I didn’t say a word.”
“You were going to.”
“I was thinking.” She reaches for her tea, taking her time with the sip while she studies me over the rim. “That baby probably has your stubbornness already.”
A laugh catches in my throat before I can stop it. “It is approximately the size of a seed. I don’t think it has developed a personality yet.”
Mrs. Vance puts her cup back on the table and gives me the same dismissive look she uses whenever I say something she considers irrelevant. “Plenty of time.”