I took one last breath.
“I’m done. Goodbye, sweetheart.”
Then I hung up.
I set the phone face down on the kitchen island. I walked to the sink, poured a glass of water, and drank it slowly.
Outside the window stood the birch tree Theo had planted the summer before he got sick. The leaves had gone gold. A magpie sat on the lowest branch and watched me through the glass as if preparing to leave a review.
I said out loud to my empty kitchen, “Okay. That’s it.”
That was all. Somewhere, wherever Theo is, I think he heard me.
On November twenty-first, the wire hit at 3:51 p.m. Eastern. $4.2 million.
Marina called me from the conference room. She was crying. I was not. I think I had nothing left.
That night, I bought myself one thing: a pair of vintage pearl earrings like the kind my grandmother used to wear. Six hundred dollars at an estate sale. I wear them every Sunday.
In February, I flew to Portland on a one-way ticket.
Renee was in labor for nine hours. The baby was eight pounds, three ounces. They named him Theo.
I held him in the hospital room for forty minutes and did not put him down once. Femi eventually had to take him from me so the baby could eat. I would like to apologize publicly to Femi for the look I gave him.
That same month, Russell called on a Tuesday.
Stanford Hartwell had tried to refinance the Hartford house using another unauthorized signature. This time, according to the bank file, the name belonged to his own daughter.
The bank review team pulled my earlier file and asked whether I wanted to expand the existing complaint into a formal referral.
I said yes.
Russell sent me a one-line email that night. Kid, you can take the sword off the wall now.
In March, Vivien called. Joselyn had filed for divorce. She had moved out of the Manhattan apartment in February, the day after she opened a piece of her father’s mail by accident and found a signature that was not her mother’s.
She rented a one-bedroom in Brooklyn and paid for it herself.
She sent me one short letter through her attorney. I’m sorry. I didn’t know.
I had Russell send back one line. I believe you.
I did not need anything more.
In April, a Hartford business paper ran a story about a civil case involving Hartwell Reston Commercial Real Estate and a regional credit union. Two of Stanford’s office parks were already in receivership. The third sold in May for far less than he once told people it was worth. His commercial real estate license was suspended pending the review.
The Hartwell house in West Hartford listed soon after. Six bedrooms, nearly five baths, twelve acres, empty staging photos. It sold in nine days. The family moved into a rental an hour outside Hartford.
The Hartford literacy board voted Margot off quietly by unanimous voice vote. She has not been invited to a single charity luncheon since, at least according to Vivien, who knows those circles the way I know wedding seating charts.
Bryce sent me four messages over six months. I read them once. I did not respond. I archived them in a folder on my phone called Later.
He took a position at a smaller firm in Stamford. A job that pays a salary and not a number. He lives in a studio in Queens. A college friend of Theo’s told me Bryce is in therapy. I hope that is true.
One day, I will be ready to talk to him. I am not ready yet.
Margot unfriended me on Facebook in March. This was interesting because I had never accepted her friend request in the first place. I had to look it up to confirm whether a person can unfriend someone who was never their friend.
Apparently, you can. I would like that on the record.
Last week, Vivien sent me one more photo. She had been at a charity luncheon in Greenwich. Margot was there alone at a table in the corner. The seat beside her was empty. The seat across from her was empty.
Vivien, who is kinder than I am, did not photograph her face. She photographed the back of her head and the two empty chairs.
That photo is on my refrigerator. I am not proud of that. Maybe a little.
I sold the Anchorage house in April. I bought a smaller house in Portland with a guest room that has a crib, a rocking chair, and a basket of board books. Theo’s photograph sits on the dresser.
I tell my grandson about his grandfather every time I babysit. He is nine months old. He will not remember it. I will.
Maxwell and Lyall by Aspenwood is doing better than we did. Marina is president. She brought me on as senior strategic adviser: one day a month, four trips to Atlanta a year, good restaurants on the company card, my opinion on three things, then home.
Best job I ever had.
I wore Cabernet Reserve to the closing dinner. I will wear it on every important day of my life until my hand is no longer steady enough to apply it.
And the cufflinks? They are still in the leather box.
Not because Bryce will never get them. Because one day, if he becomes the kind of man who can hear the whole truth without reaching for someone else’s script, I may decide they belong to him after all.
Until then, they sit in my top drawer beside Theo’s watch, waiting for a man with the courage to wear them.
