I asked her to bump into him, as if by chance, at a coffee shop, and simply talk to him for a few minutes, and pay attention, while I watched from my car across the street.

She did.

I sat with my hands cold on the wheel and watched the two of them through the glass, an old flame and the man I had married, chatting the easy chat of people with a shared past.

At one point Courtney said something and gestured, lightly, at his arm, and he smiled and answered, and it all looked perfectly ordinary.

And then she came out and crossed the street and got into my car, and her hands were shaking, and her face was the color of paper.