I dropped to my knees with a damp dishtowel, wiping the meat sauce off the floor before it could set in the tile grooves.

My fingers were slick with oil when I wiped them on my apron and stood up to face the table.

The manila envelope sat dry and untouched beside the salt shaker under the bright overhead light.

I pulled open the metal clasp and tipped the contents onto the Formica.

Three separate stapled sets of heavy paper slid out, topped by a formal blue legal cover sheet.

Knox County Chancery Court was stamped across the top in faded red ink.

My eyes moved past my own full legal name, Claire Elizabeth Whitman, to the court clerk’s docket stamp in the top right margin.

The filing date was September nineteenth.

I stared at the black numbers on the official seal.

September nineteenth was three days before Greg helped me clean the autumn leaves out of the garage gutters.

It was two full weeks before we took our annual family photograph on the porch steps with Sophie before driving her back to state college.

He had sat in a lawyer’s office in downtown Knoxville while I was still buying his favorite bran cereal at the grocery store.

He had carried this paper in his leather briefcase for thirty-two days without slipping once over our morning coffee.

Lynn sat on the edge of the guest room mattress, folding three of Greg’s broadcloth work shirts into neat squares.