Chapter 20
CLAIRE
Nora was making dinner with the caregiver.
She admired my earrings, then went back to arguing against onions.
I checked the tickets in my bag and straightened my sweater again.
Work had gone well, my shoulder was fine, and our evening was free.
I could have sat down. Instead, I kept finding reasons to look in the mirror.
Ethan stood downstairs holding a dark scarf. When he saw me, he lifted it to show me the small note still attached.
“Nora left it,” he said. “To remind me to put it around my neck instead of just carrying it.”
“I agree with her.”
I peeled off the note for him. He wrapped the scarf around his neck, then asked if he met the requirements for going out now. I tucked one end into his coat, and he bent to kiss me, his lips cool from outside.
“Now you do,” I said.
The car hadn’t arrived yet, so we walked to the edge of the porch to wait. Ethan’s phone rang. His eyebrows lifted when he saw who was calling.
“Dad?”
As he listened, he took his hand out of his pocket.
“When did he get in?… He’s already at the house?”
Standing beside him, I reached out to catch a drop of water falling from the eaves. The forecast had said it might rain tonight. I was remembering the umbrella I hadn’t put in my bag when I heard him ask, “You want me to come over now?”
His voice changed, a tentative happiness creeping into it. I looked up and saw him turn toward the end of the street, as though instinctively working out the distance.
After a while, he asked the person on the phone to wait a moment and held it a little away from his ear.
“A friend my father used to go boating with is visiting. They haven’t seen each other in years. He wants me to come home for dinner,” Ethan said. “My mother’s there too, and the people at the house are preparing dinner. He says his friend wants to see me as well.”
I nodded. I remembered his expression when he’d told me about the photograph that November evening by the river.
“He hasn’t asked me home like this in a long time,” Ethan said quietly.
My fingers touched the tickets in my bag. A corner pressed against my fingertip, small and hard. I almost said we could see the concert another time. The words were already on my lips, as practiced as all the times I’d smoothed things over for us before.
But I didn’t know when this singer would come back. I wanted to go tonight, to sit beside Ethan and hear the song we’d listened to in the car. I’d waited two months. I’d dressed half an hour early. All of it suddenly brought a sting to my nose.
I held the tickets and said nothing.
Ethan glanced at my hand, then put the phone back to his ear.
“Dad, I can’t come tonight. I’ve already promised to go to a concert with Claire.”
He paused to listen, the brightness in his eyes slowly fading. I could see him bite the inside of his cheek. His shoulders still faced me; he didn’t turn away.
“It’s not work. We made these plans in November.”
The voice on the other end went on for some time. He looked down at his feet, breathing more heavily than before.
“I know you don’t often ask me home. I want to see him too, but I already have plans tonight. Can I come see you Sunday afternoon?”
He didn’t get an answer right away. When the car pulled up at the curb, he raised a hand to signal, listened to the rest, then said, “All right. Give him my regards.”
The call ended. He put the phone in his pocket and stood for a while. I didn’t hurry him. When he raised his head, his mouth twitched in an attempt at a smile, but he couldn’t quite manage it yet.
“Let’s go. The car’s here.”
“You really wanted to go, didn’t you?” I asked.
“Yes.” He took my empty hand. “Just then, I really wanted to hear him say he’d be happy to see me.”
My throat tightened a little. “Was he angry?”
“He said he thought I could at least spare him an evening.” Ethan looked at me. “But I promised you first. This evening is already ours.”
I held his hand in return. He led me down the steps and opened the car door for me, then got in on the other side. After giving the restaurant’s address, he leaned back against the seat and let out a breath.
I took out the two tickets and smoothed the creases I’d made by clutching them. He asked if one was damaged. I shook my head and handed him one. He took it, carefully tucked it into his inner coat pocket, then told me he’d finished listening to that song from last time.
“The ending’s good.”
“That’s why I always tell you not to turn the engine off so fast.”
At last, he smiled a little. “No one’s turning it off early tonight.”
The restaurant was warm. We found a little table and ordered hot soup and sandwiches. When the server came to refill our water, Ethan was looking out the window. It took him a moment to pass over his glass.
I reached out and touched his wrist. He turned toward me. He didn’t say he was fine, just turned his palm over and took my hand.
“Still thinking about the call,” he said.
I let him hold my hand as we ate. By the time we walked to the theater, he was smiling again. He photographed me beside the poster, my hair blown across my face.
“Keep that one,” I said. “It looks as if I came a long way to be here.”
He sent it to me and led me inside. Our seats were close together. Once he’d settled his knees behind the seat in front, he held out his hand.
Before the show began, he glanced at his phone. I looked too, my gaze almost quicker than thought. He silenced it, put it away, and turned to ask which song I most wanted to hear.
I gave him the name. I was about to tell him which part I liked best when the lights went down.
The singer straightened her microphone and greeted us with a joke. Ethan’s shoulder bumped mine as we laughed. Then she plucked the first bright notes.
Her voice was lower than it sounded through headphones, her breath seeming very close.
During the second song, she stretched out a passage of accompaniment, turning to wait for the drummer to join in.
Those unexpected drumbeats made me tap my toe against the floor. Ethan noticed and tried to follow.
Every time, he was a little ahead of the people beside him.
I put my hand on his knee. He leaned in to ask what was wrong. I laid my hand in his palm and tapped twice in time with the music, having him wait for the third beat to join in. He managed for a short stretch, then came in early again. I bowed my head, unable to stop laughing.
“When you look at me, I forget how,” he said against my ear.
“Then I won’t look.”
“No. You can’t stop looking altogether either.”
Laughing, I held his hand and told him to stop counting so hard.
He leaned back in his seat and threaded his fingers through mine.
We listened to the rest of the song that way.
Even the singer laughed and said the clapping was very enthusiastic tonight, but everyone seemed to have plans of their own.
Ethan raised his eyebrows at me. I bumped him with my shoulder, and we laughed together again.
At intermission, I kissed him in the lobby while people discussed their favorite songs around us. Then I took his arm and hurried back, unwilling to miss the next note.
The song I’d been waiting for came in the second half.
At the familiar opening notes, my hand tightened first. Ethan turned to look at me.
I nodded, my eyes still on the stage. The singer had moved to the piano, with only a beam of warm light falling on her shoulders.
After the second verse, she didn’t continue as she did on the recording.
The piano circled back on its own, and the whole theater fell quiet.
I held my breath too.
That little pause was better than I’d imagined.
When she began singing again, her voice was soft, yet someone in the back still drew a small breath.
I thought of so many evenings I’d driven home, of hearing this ending in my kitchen while I waited for water to boil.
Now she was right there in front of me, Ethan was holding my hand, and no one was hurrying me to turn the song off.
After the last note, it took me a moment to applaud. Ethan started before I did, clapping loudly. When I turned to him, he leaned close and said softly, “It really is worth listening through to the end.”
For the encore, the whole audience stood.
We applauded with everyone else as the singer put her guitar back on and sang an upbeat song I didn’t know well.
I couldn’t keep up with the words, and Ethan was even less able to.
We just glanced at each other when the audience reached the repeated parts and tried to join in.
After getting it wrong once, we gave up and listened, laughing. When the house lights came on, I still didn’t quite want to leave. I waited for the people in front to shuffle out, then looked back at the piano, now empty.
As we came out of the theater, a light rain had just stopped. Streetlights shone on the wet pavement. We stood by the door putting on our coats, and Ethan gently freed the hair caught inside my collar.
“This evening means a lot to me,” I told him.
His hand paused, his gaze settling on my face. I went on, “I really wanted to come with you. When that song paused, I was so happy you heard it too.”
“I liked that part too,” he said. “I thought she’d forgotten the words. I was worried for her.”
Laughing, I caught his sleeve. “Why didn’t you say so?”
“Because what came next sounded too good. There wasn’t time.”
In the back seat, he put the program away and asked if I wanted to sit by the window. I shook my head and sat beside him. As the car passed the first intersection, I was still quietly humming those phrases. He listened for a while and finally came in on the right beat.
Smiling, I leaned against him, rested my head on his shoulder, and reached for his hand. His fingers closed around mine, his thumb gently brushing my knuckles. The streetlights slipped past the window one by one. I watched them, no longer paying attention to his phone.