3. Thea
THREE
THEA
The screwdriver kept slipping.
“It says insert dowel B into slot C.” He held up two identical pieces of wood. “These are both dowel B. There is no slot C. There has never been a slot C.”
I sat behind him with my legs stretched out, my back against the wall, eating peanut butter straight from the jar. “Did you skip a step?”
He turned and looked at me over the top of his glasses. “I didn’t skip anything.”
I laughed so hard the spoon nearly fell out of my mouth. He grinned and turned back to the manual. I watched him try to fit two mismatched pieces together, his tongue poking from the corner of his mouth.
“Give me that.” I crawled over and took the screwdriver. Our knees touched. He smelled like cedar and the laundry detergent he always used too much of.
“You don’t trust me,” he said.
“I trust you with my life. I don’t trust you with furniture.”
He kissed me — quick, laughing, his hand cupping the back of my neck. “Fine. You build. I’ll supervise.”
I blinked that memory out of my mind. I hadn't stepped back into that room since that day.
The door was closed. The key sat in my nightstand drawer under a book I no longer read. Some mornings I’d pass it on the way to the bathroom, my hand drifting toward the knob — and then the ringing would start. That high, steady tone. But I’d keep walking.
It had been a month. The trees outside the nonprofit’s windows were beginning to bud, pale green against the gray brick across the street. The world moved forward.
I was at my desk by 6:30 am. My inbox held forty-seven unread messages. The Garcia family needed emergency housing referrals. The Whitfield grant application was due in six days. Our last volunteer quit over the weekend, so I’d be covering intake shifts for the rest of the week.
Oh well, enough work to fill every hour. That was all I needed. Hours that were full. Hands that were busy.
I pulled up the Garcia file. Maria Garcia, thirty-one, had two children and received a thirty-day notice from her landlord.
I’d been working on this case for three weeks.
The shelter waitlist hadn’t moved. The transitional housing program had frozen intake the week before I needed it.
I opened a new document and started drafting the appeal letter.
Four sentences in, the front door opened and closed.
Margot’s footsteps echoed down the hall.
I didn’t look up. Soon she appeared in my doorway — orange and gold print blouse, burgundy twists pinned up, reading glasses riding on top of her head.
She carried a coffee in each hand — mine and hers — and two fingers of her right hand were stained blue from Saturday’s art therapy session, pigment ground into the creases of her knuckles.
She walked in without asking, setting my coffee on the desk without spilling it. Then she sat down across from me, crossed one leg over the other, and looked at me over the rim of her cup.
I looked back at my screen.
“So the Garcia appeal needs to go out by Thursday,” I said. “And Devon quit, so I need you to cover intake Tuesday and Wednesday. Also, the Whitfield grant. I started the narrative, but the budget still needs — ”
“Thea.”
I ignored her and continued, “The budget still needs line items for the new counseling program, and I think if we frame it as preventative rather than — ”
Margot reached across the desk and covered my hand with hers. “You’re allowed to let someone carry this for you.”
No one carries anything for me. That's not how this works. I pulled back. “I’m fine. I’m handling it.”
My phone rang. I glanced at it and groaned. My sister’s name. I cleared my throat. “I have to take this.”
Margot raised an eyebrow. “Do you? Nina will be fine if you don’t answer.”
“No. I’d rather get it over with.”
Margot nodded and rose. She paused to shoot me a sympathetic look before strolling out.
I pressed the green button. “Hey.” I tried to make my voice sound normal.
“How are you doing?” Nina asked. Her voice was careful, as if she were testing the water.
“I’m good. Busy. We need to find more funds for the nonprofit. We’ve been looking into — ”
“Thea, Caleb called me.”
I closed my eyes. Of course, he did. A few weeks of uncomfortable conversations, and the first thing he did was run to my sister.
“He said you locked the nursery,” she continued. “That you won’t give him the key.”
I pressed a finger against my temple. “That’s not what happened. The room just needs to stay closed for now.”
“For now. Okay. And when does ‘for now’ end?”
“Nina.”
“I’m asking because he’s worried. I’m worried.
You’ve been through — ” She stopped. I wished she’d just say it, so it wouldn’t live in the secret conversations between her and my husband.
“Listen, I know how hard this was. You’ve been trying for years.
The IVFs didn’t work. The adoption fell through three times before this one.
And when you finally thought you had it…
” She took a breath. “Do you need to talk to someone? A professional?”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re not fine. You’re locked in a grief spiral, and you won’t let anyone near you.”
“I have to go.”
“Thea, wait. You need to talk to Caleb. You’re pushing him out, and that’s not good for your marriage.”
Hot, white anger clouded my chest. I sat up straighter. “I don’t need advice on my marriage, Nina.”
“I’m not trying to — ”
I hung up and set the phone face down. My hand was steady, but the rest of me wasn’t.
Caleb’s car was in the driveway when I got home.
That alone was unusual. He’d been staying at his parents’ house most of the week — coming by in the mornings to shower and change while I was already at work, leaving before I got back. We’d been orbiting each other without touching, two people living in the same house in different time zones.
I sat in the car for a minute. The porch light was on. The kitchen window glowed warm. Through the glass, I could see him moving — a shadow passing back and forth in the kitchen.
He was cooking.
I walked in. The house smelled of garlic and butter. Pasta was on the stove, garlic bread in the oven, and a bottle of red wine sat on the dining table.
Caleb turned as the door clicked shut. He had on his old faded navy college T-shirt, sleeves rolled up. He looked at me and smiled.
I looked at that smile and wondered how. How could he stand in this kitchen and smile when I spent every morning walking past a locked door and pretending the room behind it didn’t exist?
“Hey.” He crossed to me and pulled me into a hug, arms circling my waist. He kissed the top of my head. “I made dinner.”
“I can see that.”
“Sit down. It’s almost ready.”
I sat. He moved back to the stove, checked the pasta, and lifted the garlic bread with a dish towel folded twice. He brought everything to the table in two trips and filled my water glass before he sat down. He shook out his napkin and picked up his fork.
We ate.
The pasta was good. It was a little overcooked because Caleb always left it in too long, and I never corrected him because the effort mattered more than the texture.
The garlic bread was perfect. He'd brushed it with butter and sprinkled it with fresh parsley.
The wine sat open between us. He poured for both of us without asking. I drank. Neither of us spoke.
Outside, a car alarm went off and stopped. The fridge hummed. Normal sounds, all of them, filling the space where conversation used to live.
Caleb set his fork down. He was looking at his plate, but I could see him searching for the words — his shoulders squared, his thumb rubbing the stem of his wine glass back and forth.
“I’ve been looking into other agencies,” he said finally. “I made an initial call. Just to see what the process looks like, what the timeline would be.”
My fork stopped. This again. I forced another bite of pasta into my mouth and chewed slowly.
“I’m not ready.”
“I know, but — ”
“I’m not ready, Caleb. I don’t think I’ll ever be.”
He was quiet for a moment. His thumb stopped moving. “When, though? When will you be ready? I’ve been walking on eggshells for a month. Waiting. On your terms. On your timeline.” He looked up. “This is hard for me, too. But you’re acting like you’re the only one dealing with it.”
I stood. “Is that why you called my sister?”
His eyes widened. He hadn’t expected Nina to share. He looked away and sighed, then came toward me. His hands found my shoulders. “Baby, I don’t like this any more than you do, but we need to move quickly. The window for — ”
My phone rang on the counter. I reached past him and grabbed it, the movement putting distance between his hands and my body. He let me go.
He squeezed my elbow, then moved to the living room. “We’ll finish this conversation.”
I looked at the screen. Mom.
Not now. But the phone kept ringing, and standing there holding it was worse than answering, so I picked it up and wedged it between my ear and shoulder. My hands were already reaching for the plates. I needed to clean. I needed to move.
“Baby, you will not believe what Ray did this weekend.” Lorraine’s voice poured through. “He surprised me with tickets to that show I was telling you about — you remember, the one with the singer, the tall one?”
“Mmhmm.” I carried the plates to the kitchen, scraped the leftovers into a container, and ran the water.
“The waiter knew him by name, and Ray ordered this bottle of wine that was just. He said the sweetest thing to me at dinner. He said, ‘Lorraine, I’ve never met a woman who lights up a room the way you do.’ Can you believe that? I almost cried right there at the table.”
“That’s great, Mom.”
I glanced toward the living room. Caleb sat on the couch, phone pressed to his ear, voice low, back to me. I turned the faucet down and strained to hear.
“Yes, I understand the timeline. And the home study — how long does that typically — right. Right, okay.”
My stomach dropped. I gripped the counter.
“Mom, I’ll call you back.”
“Oh, okay, baby. Call me later, because I have to tell you about what Ray said about — ”
I hung up, set the phone down, and dried my hands slowly, buying time to cross the kitchen and hallway and arrive in the living room without running.
Caleb saw me coming. His face changed.
“I’ll call you back,” he said into the phone. He dropped the call and set it on the couch.
“Don’t stop on my account. I see you like making decisions behind my back.”
His face fell. “Thea, it’s not — ”
“Is this why you came home? I don’t see you for three days, and you come back to pressure me?”
“No. I…my parents thought — ”
I scoffed. “What? Mommy made you come home?”
“Thea…that’s just mean.”
“You’re not exactly a saint yourself. You keep pushing.
You won’t give me time. You won’t let me breathe.
” I was moving toward him, my voice rising, and I couldn’t stop either one.
“Let’s get a baby, Thea. Let’s talk to this agency, Thea.
Let’s try again, Thea. What about what I’m feeling?
What about the fact that I’m — that I — ”
My throat closed. I swallowed past it. “I’m sorry I’m so defective that we have to beg for a baby.”
Caleb flinched. “Don’t say that.”
“Three rounds of IVF, Caleb. Three rounds. I sat in that clinic every time, and they put — they put those things in my body, and I waited and prayed, and it didn’t work.
Then the adoption fell through — not once, not twice, three times before this one.
And when we finally — when I thought we finally — ”
I pressed my fist against my mouth. My eyes stung. I blinked it back. “I’m tired. My body is tired. My heart is tired. I can’t keep doing this.”
Caleb stepped toward me. His eyes were red. “I don’t think you’re defective. I love you. We’re in this together.”
“Then go ahead and say it.”
“Say what?”
“Whatever you’re not saying to my face. Maybe you’ll call my sister and tell her.” I stepped back and put space between us. “You can just leave. You don’t need me to have a baby. You’re fine. I’m the one with the problem.”
He stared at me. Eyes bloodshot, hands shaking at his sides, mouth opening and closing. The clock on the wall ticked. The fridge hummed.
“You don’t mean that.” His voice cracked. “Thea, you…you can’t…”
“I mean it. Go.”
“I won’t come back. Because I can’t — I don’t know how to be with you like this. If I walk out that door, I won’t be back.”
I didn’t look at him. “Go.”
He stood there for another second. Two. I could feel him looking at me, waiting for me to take it back, to turn, to say something — anything — that would give him permission to stay.
I didn’t.
He turned, walked to the door, and opened it. The night air came in, cool and smelling of rain. Then the door closed behind him.
The sound it made was the loudest thing I’d ever heard.