CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
ALEXANDER
Lily eats cereal from a yellow bowl.
It cannot be the blue one, as I discover after serving her breakfast and receiving a look of profound disappointment.
“That one is for soup.”
I study both bowls. They are the same size, the same shape, and apart from the color, there is no difference I can identify.
“Is there a reason the blue bowl is exclusively reserved for soup?”
“Yes.”
She does not explain what the reason is.
I do not press. I transfer the cereal into the yellow bowl and add only a small amount of milk, which must be cold, never warm.
The banana has to be sliced into rounds rather than lengthwise because otherwise it “looks weird.” There are also two pieces of toast without crusts, one with butter and one plain.
I make a mental note of everything.
For years, I have conducted meetings in which I needed to memorize figures, names, and market projections delivered within minutes of one another. None of that information ever seemed as important as the exact amount of milk my daughter accepts in her cereal.
Lily takes another spoonful and narrows her eyes.
“You’re staring at me.”
“I’m learning.”
“What?”
“How you eat breakfast.”
“I don’t drink coffee.”
“It’s an expression.”
She chews while considering my answer.
“You talk weird.”
“So I’ve been told.”
The kitchen door opens before she can ask by whom.
Isabella walks in speaking on the phone, dressed in a beige suit and pale blouse. Her hair is pinned into a bun that looks as though it was done quickly, leaving a few loose strands at the nape of her neck.
The sight throws me five years into the past with such force that I have to look toward the sink.
The memory is not of anything remarkable. It is simply Isabella crossing the kitchen in our old house, ready for work, complaining because I had finished the coffee. Back then, I knew her routine with the arrogant intimacy of someone who believed it would never change.
“Yes, I can be there by nine,” she says into the phone. “I don’t want to reschedule. Send the revised version to Helena and tell the client we’ll have it resolved before the meeting.”
Her voice is assured and precise. It is the same voice she used when she worked for someone else, except now she does not ask permission or look for approval. Isabella built a company, a reputation, and an entire professional life while I was not there to see any of it.
She ends the call, puts the phone into her bag, and looks at Lily.
“Did you brush your teeth?”
“Yes.”
“Truthfully?”
“Dad saw.”
Isabella looks at me.
“I did. There was an attempt to reduce the required duration, but enforcement intervened.”
“He counted to a hundred,” Lily complains.
“The dentist recommended two minutes.”
“A hundred takes longer.”
“That depends on how quickly you count.”
“He counted slowly on purpose.”
Isabella hides a smile as she checks the things arranged near the door.
“Backpack?”
“In the hall,” I say.
“Lunch?”
“In the fridge.”
She stops and looks at me again.
“You made it?”
“Yes.”
“What did you put in?”
“Cheese sandwich, peeled apple, grapes cut lengthwise because apparently there is choking guidance I should have known about, and one biscuit.”
Lily raises a finger.
“Two.”
“Two biscuits,” I correct.
“There is, in fact, guidance about cutting grapes,” Isabella says. “Thank you for checking.”
It is a simple word, perfectly ordinary, yet my body reacts as though I have just been awarded some distinction.
“Of course.”
She moves toward the counter to collect the cup she left beside the coffee machine. The movement brings her perfume with it, a subtle fragrance that is not the same one she wore five years ago and yet still creates an immediate sense of familiarity.
Isabella takes a sip of coffee while searching through her bag. One strand has escaped her bun and become trapped beneath the collar of her blazer, pulling the fabric slightly crooked.
My first instinct is to free it.
The memory of the right I once had to touch her comes before I can stop it. I used to move her hair aside as I passed, kiss the back of her neck while she made coffee, and fasten the buttons on her dresses when we were late for dinner.
Now even a strand of hair caught beneath her collar requires a decision that is not mine to make.
Isabella notices me looking.
“What?”
“Your hair is caught in your collar.”
She reaches toward the wrong shoulder and searches for it.
“The other side.”
Her fingers miss again.
Lily watches the attempt while chewing her toast.
“Dad can get it.”
The silence changes.
Isabella could step away, find a mirror, or simply ignore the hair. Instead, she remains where she is and tips her head slightly.
“You can.”
The permission should not affect me as much as it does.
I move closer slowly. With one hand, I hold the edge of her blazer and use the other to free the strand, trying to avoid touching her skin.
I fail.
My fingertips brush the nape of her neck just beneath her hairline.
Isabella catches her breath.
The contact lasts less than two seconds, but my body recognizes the warmth of her skin and the nearness of her perfume as though the five years between us never happened.
I have to suppress the urge to leave my fingers there, to feel the curve of her neck again and discover whether she still shivers when my mouth touches that particular spot.
I step back immediately.
“There.”
It takes Isabella a moment to turn.
Her eyes meet mine. There is surprise in them, but something else too, something she hides before I can decide whether I truly saw it.
“Thank you,” she says again.
Her voice is lower.
Lily watches us with her spoon suspended halfway to her mouth.
“You said thank you twice.”
“Because your dad did two things.”
“Three. He cut the grapes.”
Isabella looks away and raises her cup. I can see a faint flush along her neck, although perhaps it is only the warmth of the kitchen.
“You’re right,” she says. “Thank you for the grapes too.”
“It was a comprehensive service.”
The tension loosens enough for all of us to breathe normally again, but it does not disappear. It remains beneath the conversation, present every time Isabella touches the strand I freed from her collar.
She checks the time.
“I need to go. I’ll take Lily.”
“Can I?”
Isabella stills with the keys in her hand.
“What?”
“Can I take Lily to school?”
Our daughter immediately looks from me to her mother but, to her credit, stays silent.
“Today?” Isabella asks.
“Yes. My first meeting is virtual, and I can join from the car after I drop her off.”
“I don’t know.”
The hesitation causes a small, immediate disappointment, but I do not try to overcome it with schedules, arguments, or assurances.
“All right.”
I wait.
Something in Isabella’s expression shifts.
“You’re not going to push?”
“You said you don’t know. Until you decide, the answer is no.”
Lily points her spoon at me.
“That was deep.”
Isabella laughs, and I do too. The ease of the moment is as unexpected as the touch at her neck.
“Not today,” she decides. “I still need to add your name to the authorized collection list, but you can pick her up on Thursday.”
My heart reacts strongly enough that keeping my expression neutral becomes difficult.
“All right.”
“The school will need your identification.”
“I’ll take care of it.”
Isabella narrows her eyes.
“Do not buy the school.”
“I wasn’t planning to buy it.”
She keeps staring.
“I considered it for approximately two seconds,” I admit. “Purely for procedural efficiency.”
“Alexander.”
“I won’t buy it.”
“Dad can’t buy school,” Lily informs me. “The headmistress won’t let him.”
“Finally, an effective regulatory system.”
Isabella puts the lunch into Lily’s backpack, kisses her cheek, and leads her toward the door. Before leaving, she looks back over her shoulder. Her gaze drops for the briefest second to my hand, the one that touched the nape of her neck, then returns to my face.
“Thursday. Three fifteen. Not three sixteen.”
“I’ll be there.”
The door closes.
I remain alone in the kitchen, looking at the blue bowl that is apparently permitted to contain only soup.
The silence does not feel empty.
It feels like an interval.
On Thursday, I arrive at the school twenty minutes early.
My official justification is the possibility of traffic, though even I recognize that I left unnecessarily early. I park on the side street instead of directly outside the gate, following Isabella’s instructions not to attract press attention or turn school collection into a security operation.
Parents, grandparents, nannies, and younger siblings wait nearby. No one pays attention to me for the first few minutes. Then two people recognize me, one woman whispers to another, and a man pretends to check his phone while taking a photograph.
I ignore it.
I am not here as Alexander Thorne, controlling shareholder of a company worth billions or unwilling protagonist of a marriage now being dissected by the newspapers.
I am here to collect Lily.
The gate opens at three fifteen. Children begin spilling out in groups, carrying backpacks, coats, and paper projects that seem too large for their hands.
I look for the red dress Isabella described.
I cannot see it.
Seconds pass, and an irrational part of me starts inventing problems with the authorized list, changes in schedule, or some danger no one else has noticed. I am about to approach one of the teachers when Lily appears behind two taller children.
She sees me.
Her whole face lights up.
“DAD!”
The shout crosses the playground and attracts every pair of eyes I had been trying to avoid.
None of them matters.
Lily runs toward me with her backpack bouncing against her back. I crouch before she reaches me and am caught off guard when she throws herself straight into my arms.
It is the first time she has hugged me without me initiating anything.
For half a second, I freeze, unable to process the small, warm weight against my chest. Then I wrap my arms around her.
She smells of strawberry shampoo, colored pencils, and something sweet that probably was not in the lunch I packed.