Rick saw the green on a Saturday handoff and said it looked different. Lisa said it was. He did not ask to come in. The step rule had loosened into a porch rule. Porch was progress of a kind. He told Cole, in the truck, that he had been wrong to say one time. Cole said Mom already said the number was three. Rick said three was right and still too many. Cole said I know. The I know was Lisa’s hardness in a smaller mouth. Rick took it. He bought pizza. Pizza remained the report.
Mike’s dog died in March. Rick called Lisa to say he would be late bringing Cole because of the vet. Lisa said take the time. The taking was not forgiveness. It was a dog. Dogs were innocent of jerseys. Cole patted the dog’s empty bed and came home smelling like Mike’s couch and said Uncle Mike cried. Lisa said good, somebody should. Cole said Dad did too. Lisa said that was allowed. Allowed was a new shelf. She put things on it carefully. The thread did not go on the shelf. The dog did.
By spring the drawer phone was off and in a box in the closet. Joan had copies of what mattered. Lisa did not read the thread for fun. Fun was a word that had left the family room. She watched a game once, sound low, and turned it off at the half. Cole asked why. She said the sound was too big. He accepted big. He was thirteen in May. Thirteen asked harder questions. He asked if they were getting divorced. Lisa said separated, and the papers were not finished, and she did not know the last page. He said okay. Okay had been the door. It was still a door. She did not push him through it.
The retrofit at the clinic had been Tuesdays, six to ten, a ceiling and a set of outlets and a scheduler who stayed late because the software crashed when it rained. Heather brought Rick coffee from the machine and said the machine was a punishment. He said he knew punishments. He meant the drive. He let her hear a marriage. Selected truth. Lisa was tired. Lisa was at her sister’s. The kid had practice. The practice was real. The sister was a flute. The flute was not a Sunday pass. He used it as one. Heather believed the pass because it was easier than asking a second question. Easier was how the shirt got into a photo. The photo was a joke about the gray looking better on her. Jokes had a lock screen. Lock screens had wives. The chain was short. He had walked it anyway.