I have had the frame in my apron since June, waiting for a day that felt like the right one.”

The porch door scraped open, and David came out with his coffee in the blue mug he had taken from this kitchen when he moved out.

“Don’t let her stand up,” he said.

“She’ll stand up and not sit down again until supper.”

“I am right here,” Martha said.

“I know it.

That’s why I said it out loud.”

She laughed and threw a bulb at him, and it landed in the grass, and he picked it up and dropped it back into her sack.