"Hello, Dr. Caldwell."
"Joe is fine."
"Would you like to come in? I just put the kettle on."
"That's kind. I won't keep you. Just wanted to come by and say hello. Welcome you back."
I stayed in the doorway. He didn't take a step toward it. We had agreed on the geometry without saying so.
"I knew your folks," he said. "Your dad did some work for me back in the day. Saw your mother at the grocery store when you were—" he held a hand at the height of a small child "—about so high. Pigtails, both of you."
"That sounds like her."
"It's good to have you home."
"Thank you."
He looked out at the porch railing for a beat, then back at me. The smile was still in place, and so was the warmth, but something underneath had finished arranging itself.
"I've been thinking about you, actually. I heard you were filing for permits."
"I am."
"I have to be honest with you, Astrid." He used my first name the way some men used it: as a small claim, not a familiarity. "The town can't really support two practices. I'd hate to see a young woman put everything she has into something that wasn't going to take."
"I'm sure there's room."
"Mhm."
He nodded and considered the porch railing again, tucking his hands into the vest pockets.
"Well, I'll let you get back to your afternoon."
"Thank you for stopping by."
"You take care, Astrid."
I shut the door.
The kettle had gone cold. The permits were still on the table where I'd left them, and none of them had moved.
My pulse was in my ears, and my shoulders were up around them. I didn't register crossing the room until I already had both hands flat on the counter, standing there breathing through my nose like a woman on the back end of a flight of stairs she hadn't meant to climb.
I knew this body. I'd had it for six years.
I sat back down at the table.
The supply order was open. I picked up the pen and looked at the line I'd been working on before the kettle, trying to remember which version of the surgical scissors I'd been considering.
I couldn't.
I set the pen down.
It wasn't what he said. It was the way he said it. Brett's mother had been running a softer version of it on me for six years. Same script. Different man.
The script followed me here.
I got up, walked to the sink, and stood there with both hands on the counter, looking at nothing. The white of the porcelain was the same white it always was. The light through the kitchen window was the same light. The script followed me here, and the room around me hadn't shifted one degree to acknowledge it.
