“Do not touch me.” He stopped.

And the room narrowed down to the counter and the blue plate and Noah’s glass and the folder under Keith’s arm, and Keith looked at the plate again and said, very quietly, “You both need to sit still.”

I did not understand it yet.

I want to be clear about that.

Nothing had been proven; I had a husband behaving strangely and a dizziness that could have been a dozen innocent things, and the mind protects itself, in those first minutes, by reaching for every explanation except the true one.

Keith gathered the dishes and told us he would handle everything, and when I asked where the folder was, he said it was safe.