At first, I told myself it was because I brought coffee.
Then one morning, I entered without it because the café machine was broken.
He smiled anyway.
The photographs remained on his table.
He rearranged them often.
Family in one stack.
The yard in another.
Marlowe and the apartment together.
Photographs of us lay nearest the bed.
I never mentioned it.
A week after Leah’s visit, I arrived to find the room empty.
The bed had been stripped.
Noah’s magazines were gone.
The photographs remained on the table, but panic did not care about evidence.
I dropped my bag.
A nurse I did not recognize looked up from the linen cart.
“Where is he?”
“He go.”
“Where?”
She pointed vaguely toward the corridor.
My pulse thundered.
“Where did Noah go?”
Another nurse hurried in.
“Reid. It’s all right. He’s showering.”
I gripped the bed rail.
The first nurse smiled, apparently unaware that she had nearly stopped my heart.
“They took him ten minutes ago,” the second nurse said. “He had a rough night and wanted to freshen up.”
“What happened?”
“Nightmares.”
The word changed the air.
