“I’ll be there.”

She studied me carefully — searching for hesitation, for escape, for the old version of me who softened disappointment with careful words. Whatever she saw made her nod.

“Then I’ll tell you after.”

She tucked the envelope beneath the medical folder, but one corner stayed visible. A white triangle with my name on it.

That night we ate toast and soup while rain stitched silver lines down the glass. We didn’t talk about love again. Instead we discussed small things — the leaky faucet, her stubborn fern, my terrible apartment, burnt coffee, the neighbors upstairs who apparently argued every Thursday about recycling.

It was the kind of conversation married people have when they believe there’ll be endless evenings to say the bigger things later.