We did not name it date night or turn it into another calendar obligation.

Some weeks we went for walks.

Other weeks we cooked, badly at first, and made fun of our attempts to follow recipes.

Once we spent an entire evening sorting photographs that had been left in boxes since our wedding.

We found pictures of guests we had barely spoken to, our families smiling on a day when so much had gone unsaid, and one candid image of Meredith looking directly at me.

I could see her affection in it now.

She pointed to a photograph of me and said the same thing.

We put those two pictures in a frame on the bookshelf, beside the letters we had finally learned to share.