Maeve and I are on the couch in the living room. Nora is asleep upstairs. The television is on with the sound off because we have been pretending to watch a movie neither of us has tracked. The fire is going in the small grate. Maeve has her head against my shoulder. The bandaged arm is mostly healed.
"Two days."
"Two days.You ready?”
"I will be there."
"I know."
She’s quiet for a long second.
Then she says, "Lex."
“Yes, Maeve?”
"Whatever you wanted to ask me. After the grand jury. The answer is yes. It will always be yes.”
I go very still.
"I am not making you wait," she says. "The answer is yes."
I smile, but I don’t do what I want to do, which is to drop to one knee in our living room and propose to her in front of the grate and the unwatched movie. The proposal is for after the grand jury. The proposal is for the night I have been planning since I drove home from the warehouse with Andreev in my throat. It’s going to happen the way I have planned it, with my mother and the ring and the Greek words I have been preparing.
I do, however, pull her closer.
I press my mouth to the top of her hair.
I say, into her hair, low, the only sentence I am going to give her tonight.
"After the grand jury."
Chapter 28
Maeve
Before Words
Eleni picks Nora up at 4:47 PM on a Saturday.
It is the second Saturday of January. Nora is in a small wool coat over the dinosaur pajamas because Nora has decided that for this overnight, she’ll travel as the version of herself she travels best as.
Dinosaurs underneath and dignity over the top. Eleni doesn’t argue. She lovingly puts the wool coat on her granddaughter, shoulders the small overnight bag I have packed, and hands me a tin of ‘kourabiedes’ she’s made fresh this morning. Because Eleni doesn’t arrive at her son’s house empty-handed, even when she’s leaving with his daughter.
"Maeve."
"Yes, Eleni."
"You will be fine."
"I have been left alone before."
Eleni looks at me with the knowing look of a woman who has raised four sons and has, as a result, learned to identify the version of ‘fine’ that is a question disguised as a statement.
She doesn’t press. She doesn’t tease. She simply puts her hand on my arm and says, "You are home. He’s here. The two of you have been waiting for an evening to be the people you arewhen no one else is in the building. Tonight is the evening. Eat dinner slowly. Do not look at the clock. I will bring her home tomorrow at 3:00 PM and not a minute earlier."
"Eleni."
"Yes, Maeve."
