“It is exactly four hundred,” he corrected, not turning around.

“My mother has invited the entire board of the historical society.” The wind off the ocean scratched at the old windowpanes, a dry sound that made the large room feel much smaller than it was, and I sat there with my own ledger warm under my hand and understood that I had stopped speaking freely in my own house some time ago, and had not noticed the day it happened.

That is how it works, I have learned since.

Not a wall built in an afternoon.