tching the darkness until the grandfather clock chimed

marriage, everything important fit in one bag. My who

plained. I'd learned to disappear because I had to. Some women became experts at hiding bruises; I be

n the upsta

it would be Naomi's. Down the hall, Lily's door stood slightly open, her

dn't look insi

the blanket. Asleep, she looked just as she had as a baby, without the tense, guarded se

want you

kiss her forehead, and breathe in her warm hair. I wanted to say

r bed as Mary's sharp words and Nicholas's silence closed around me until there

, baby," I

yed o

e narrow door at the end of the ha

ase. The straps had stiffened in the cold. For a moment, I wondered if taking it m

k it

dn't thrown away-probably because

t grass, the cello case bumping my hip, and stopped beneath

I planted it twice more. After the second

ud. It felt wrong, like reaching for s

anyone, I told mys

true, and lately I had litt

kept looking at his phone. Nobody notices

nd slick under the streetlights. Rain misted d

hip people still remembered me, perhaps Grasse. Or a city I'd never seen, with a room, one window, and a

ist of wha

reathe lavender before an

without apologizi

bed without a

grance with my na

man who wasn't someone's

much. My e

had worn so thin that a little light got through. And once it did, I couldn't ignor

n choose

ibrated in

from the f

ere are you? We ne

2:41. It

was the first time he'd used it with me all

la

g, dying, loving him until I'd lost myself. I imagined his quick reply,

d off t

ack in m

ckened, tapp

at the crosswalk with my suitcase and

le. The whole city slept, and s

urned green, and I st

g behind me, somewhere to the left. I loo

rain, coming straight at me so fast they seemed frozen, l

s scr

horror sharpe

green, I thoug

he car

spin into the dark as my suitcase burst open and clothes scattered across

as dark a

sleeping, h

ght. I didn't even

ed up, and everything