Page 45 of Wreckage and Rain

“Just think about it,” I say. “And this time, don’t think about what you can say to make it go away.”

I walk down the hall and close the guest-room door.

I sit on the edge of the bed and listen.

At first, there is nothing.

Then his footsteps move across the living room.

Back and forth.

They stop.

Start again.

He never comes to the door.

I can’t decide whether that means he is respecting what I asked for or relieved that he doesn’t have to face me again tonight.

I open my laptop.

The cursor blinks in the middle of the chapter I haven’t been able to finish for weeks. I start a new page.

My heroine has spent half the book convinced the danger is outside her house. Someone watching through windows. Footsteps in the yard. A shadow that keeps appearing at the edge of every room.

Then she realizes the doors were never keeping the threat out.

They were keeping it in.

The first paragraph comes fast.

Then the second.

It is the best thing I have written in months.

I write until two in the morning.

The whole time, some stupid, tender piece of me listens for his footsteps in the hall.

For a knock.

For him to say my name through the door and tell me he finally understands.

It never comes.

Eventually, the house goes quiet.

I close the laptop and turn off the light.

I told him I was drowning, and he argued about the water.

I told him another woman was living in the space between us, and he defended every reason she had been allowed inside.

He heard every word I said.

He just still thinks the problem is that I noticed.

Chapter 9: The Fix