That is the thing I am least proud of and most understand about myself, looking back — that my whole instinct that morning was to smooth it over, to be easy, to not make the new marriage crack on its very first day.

So I said something bright and meaningless back, and I helped Victoria out of the bed, and I let the papers on the nightstand disappear into her handbag without a word, and I went and made coffee for a houseful of departing relatives with my hands not quite steady.

But that evening, when the last guest was gone and the house was finally quiet, I went into the laundry room for a reason I’ve forgotten, and I found the sheets from our bed already stripped and washed and tumbling in the dryer.

Not in the hamper.

Not waiting with the rest of the wash.

Already done — pulled off the bed that same morning and run through hot before anyone had asked, before the honeymoon was even a day old.