The walk back to Elm Street was cold enough to make my ears sting. I let myself in through the kitchen door, moving without a sound, but the floorboards in the hallway always knew my weight.
Richard was sitting on the bottom step of the stairs in the dark, his shadow long against the wallpaper. He did not have his shoes on, and his socks were gray against the wood.
“Where were you?” he asked.
“The library,” I said, hanging my wool coat on the brass hook. “I lost track of the time.”
Richard stood up, his tall frame blocking the narrow corridor. He looked down at my feet, his gaze fixed on the worn leather of my loafers.
“The library does not have red clay in the parking lot,” Richard said, pointing a finger at the mud dried on the welt of my shoe. “The county paved that lot three years ago.”
I pulled my feet back into the shadow of the umbrella stand.
“I took the shortcut by the creek,” I said. “It was dark.”
Richard rubbed the back of his neck, his fingers pressing hard into the skin.
“You have a home to run, Martha,” he said. “The children do not need a mother who wanders the streets after ten o’clock.”
“Toby was asleep when I left,” I said.
“Toby has class at eight,” Richard said, his voice flat. “He needs his breakfast on the table, not a mother who sleeps until noon.”
He turned and walked back up the stairs, his bare feet making a dull thud on each riser. I waited until I heard his bedroom door click shut before I took off my shoes and carried them to the kitchen sink.
At eight the next morning, the house was empty except for Clara, who sat at the kitchen table drawing small, dark boxes on her napkin with a blue ballpoint pen. I moved through the living room with the yellow dusting cloth, wiping the wood frames of the family photographs and the walnut shelves of the bookcase.
