Epilogue
Ten months later, I wake alone in Maui.
For one disorienting second, terror rips through me.
The ocean burns gold beyond the curtains. White orchids sit on the nightstand. Caleb's side of the bed is empty, and the shower is silent.
Then I hear him singing from the balcony.
He is wearing nothing but a towel and holding two cups of coffee. His wedding ring catches the morning light.
"You were supposed to be sleeping," he says.
"You were supposed to bring coffee."
"I did."
"Then why is it out there?"
"Because past Caleb booked sunrise breakfast again, and present Caleb is still an ambitious bastard."
I step onto the balcony and take my cup.
This is our third morning in Maui. We chose a different hotel because neither of us wanted to sleep in the room where our first honeymoon ended, but the view is almost identical. The island did not keep our tragedy. It has been waiting all this time, beautiful and indifferent.
My apartment lease is renewed for another year.
Caleb does not have a key.
He knows where Ivy keeps the emergency copy, but he has never used it. Three months ago, I came down with the flu and stopped answering my phone. Caleb drove across town, knocked for ten minutes, and called Ivy rather than letting himself in.
I was furious when I finally opened the door.
"You could have come inside," I croaked.
"You told me not to."
"I was sick."
"Illness is not blanket consent."
"I married an instructional pamphlet."
He made soup, slept on the sofa because I refused to let him leave, and woke every four hours to check my fever. In the morning, I gave him a new key.
He handed it back.
"Not while you're sick," he said. "Ask me again when you can stand without swaying."
I waited a week.
Then I decided I still was not ready.
Caleb kissed me and said okay.
The key remains on my dresser, uncut.
Sometimes I move it beside my keys. Sometimes I put it back in the drawer. Caleb has never asked which place means more.
I spend most nights at the house now. Caleb moved home five months ago after we decided selling it would be another decision made in panic. My apartment has become an office, an occasional refuge, and proof that staying is something I choose every morning.
We still attend counseling twice a month.
We still fight.
Last week, Caleb found me holding his phone and asked what I was looking for.
"Breakfast," I said.
"Then why do you look guilty?"
"Because you put it facedown."
"The screen was lighting up."
"So you hid it."
"From the ceiling, Dahlia. I hid the screen from the ceiling."
We shouted for thirty ugly minutes. I accused him of treating me like a suspicious wife. He accused me of wanting him permanently guilty because innocence would leave me with nothing to fight. He slept on top of the blankets. I kicked him twice, once deliberately.
In the morning, the phone lay faceup between us. We had missed dinner, ruined the sheets with cold coffee, and finished the fight instead of pretending it had not happened.
Trust has not returned as a magical feeling. It exists in hundreds of ordinary decisions.
Caleb telling me Sable attempted to follow him from a new account before he blocked it.
Me admitting the notification frightened me instead of punishing him with silence.
Caleb going to Owen's wedding without treating my anxiety as an accusation.
Me attending for one hour, leaving when I needed to, and trusting him to come home later.
There have been no more grand gestures.
Almost.
"What is that?" I ask.
A red silk blindfold lies folded beside his coffee.
Caleb nearly drops his cup. "It was in the breakfast basket. I was going to throw it away."
I pick it up.
His face goes pale. "Dahlia."
"Do you trust me?"
"Yes."
"Completely?"
He considers the question with the seriousness it deserves.
"No," he says. "Not completely. I trust you enough to say this scares the hell out of me."
I tie the silk around his eyes.
Caleb goes very still.
"Who am I?" I ask.
"My wife."
"How do you know?"
"Your perfume. The tiny scar on your thumb. The way you breathe when you are trying to frighten me."
I put his hand on my waist.
"Anything else?"
"You are the only person in the world who would make this romantic and terrifying at the same time."
I kiss him.
He responds, but he does not reach for me until I whisper yes against his mouth.
When I remove the blindfold, Caleb's eyes are wet.
"I thought I chose you then," he says.
"You chose me after you nearly lost me."
He closes his eyes. "I know."
I touch his face. "You don't get credit for rewriting that night. You get credit for what you do today."
"Then let me do today right."
We dress and walk down to the beach. There are no guests, cameras, speeches, or witnesses. The only music is the surf.
Caleb has arranged a private breakfast beneath a white canopy. I stare at him.
"Is this a grand gesture?"
"It is pancakes."
"There are orchids."
"Maui has an orchid surplus."
"And champagne."
"That came with the pancakes."
"Liar."
"Recovering liar."
I sit across from him, the ocean moving beyond his shoulder.
"You know the motorcycle did not buy this," I say.
"I know. It bought Ivy five days in Maui and several drinks involving fire."
"The airport didn't buy it either."
"That one should have. Do you know what those screens cost?"
I kick him beneath the table.
He catches my ankle between his calves, smiling until my expression turns serious.
"I forgave you because you kept doing the work after everyone stopped watching."
He reaches across the table, palm up. "I am going to keep doing it."
"I know."
We eat breakfast. Then we leave our shoes beneath the canopy and walk toward the water.
The waves are cool around my ankles. Caleb takes my hand but lets me choose how far we go.
The first honeymoon ended because I had to leave before he came out of the shower.
This one begins with both of us awake, both of us honest, and neither of us looking away.
THE END