“I left the bed as she had left it, unmade and rumpled, coverlets awry, so that her body's print might rest still warm beside my own.Until the next day I did not go to bathe, I wore no clothes and did not dress my hair, for fear I might erase some sweet caress.That morning I did not eat, nor yet at dusk, and put no rouge nor powder on my lips, so that her kiss might cling a little longer.I left the shutters closed, and did not open the door, for fear the memory of the night before might vanish with the wind.”

“He missed you just as I did. He worried about you just as I worried. He looked for you. Tried to find you. Just as I did. But you were gone.” She took a step toward him. “You think he left you? It was you who left, Michael. You left us.” Her voice was shaking now, all the anger and sadness and fear she had felt in those months, those years after Michael had disappeared. “You left me.” She put her hands to his chest, pushing him with all her might, with all her anger. “And I missed you so much. I missed you so much. I still do, damn you.”

“He was with me, beside me, inside me, and I did not care that my children were asleep, alone at home, or that the neighbors might come to know. He burned the fear out of me until all was left was desire.”

“This was full when I left. Demon, did you eat some of my toothpaste?”

“She left me, offended at my want of sympathy, and thinking, no doubt, that I envied her. I did not - at least, I firmly believed I did not.”

“How did I do that to her? Her? Punching trees and screaming? She must have been terrified.Soon his hands would heal, so he might forget the pain he’d caused her. He’d left her in the woods. Left her. Watching her find her car and punch it with the same delicate hand she’d put so trustingly in his was too much.”