One morning I woke at 1:17 a.m. out of old instinct.

The house was quiet.

I went downstairs expecting, for one confused second, to hear a voice on a phone.

There was no one there.

Only the refrigerator humming and the small blue bowl from my pottery class on the windowsill.

I sat in one of the new chairs.

At first, the silence felt enormous.

Then I realized it belonged to me.