I came home two days earlier than planned, a bottle of red wine and a box of pastries on the passenger seat beside me. That was the kind of surprise I thought I’d bring home. A small one.
The transportation conference in Columbus had ended a day and a half ahead of schedule, partly because the keynote speaker had canceled and partly because everyone was eager to leave anyway. Instead of staying alone in the hotel room for two more nights, eating room-service food and watching cable news with the sound low, I changed my ticket and took the first available flight home. I didn’t call Sarah.
I didn’t text Michael. I didn’t tell anyone, because after twenty-three years of marriage I still loved the feeling of seeing my wife’s expression change when I walked into a room she thought would be empty until Sunday. I bought the wine at an airport shop before boarding.
A cab driver on the interstate recommended the bakery, said his wife ordered from there for every birthday in the family. I stopped on the way home, left the engine running, and came out with a white box tied with twine. Pastries with almond cream and one tart she liked.
I was grinning when I pulled into our street. At 5:18 in the afternoon on that Friday in October, I drove into the yard and saw Michael’s SUV parked by the curb. That should have made me smile.
It didn’t. There are small things you notice before your mind lets you assemble the larger picture from them. The porch lights were still on even though the sun hadn’t set.
The front door wasn’t fully latched. Inside, the house smelled of lemon-scented floor cleaner and something underneath it that I identified a half-second too late. Something sharp and metallic.
I pushed the door open with my shoulder, one hand holding the wine, the other the pastry box. Sarah was on the floor. She was sitting up against the base of the sofa with one hand pressed to her right eyebrow.
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