The woman’s voice remained gentle but firm.
“If every time you want me, you decide that means you loved her less, then there is no place for me here.”
The father’s jaw tightened.
“I don’t know how to fix that.”
“I don’t need you to fix it tonight.”
She picked up her jacket.
“Where are you going?”
“Home.”
His face fell.
She stepped closer.
“Not leaving you.”
“Going home.”
“There’s a difference.”
The father nodded.
She touched his arm.
“Read her letter again.”
Then left.
He hated that advice.
Which usually meant it was useful.
That night he waited until the baby slept.
Then opened the letter.
He had read it dozens of times.
Different sentences changed depending on what he feared.
This time one line seemed larger.
Do not confuse loyalty to me with loneliness.
Then another:
My love is not preserved by keeping empty space around her.
He stared.
The sentence had been about their daughter.
Maybe not only their daughter.
He took out photographs.
His wife laughing beside the horse trailer.
His wife holding their newborn daughter.
His wife asleep on the couch with one hand resting on her chest because late pregnancy exhausted her.
He spoke aloud.
“I don’t know how to do this.”
No answer.
Of course.
He laughed bitterly.
Then:
“I’m scared that being happy means you become smaller.”
Still no answer.
He sat.
The baby monitor glowed beside him.
Finally he whispered:
“You would hate that.”
He knew.
His wife had hated being turned into symbols even while alive.
She hated when people described marriage as “two halves making one whole.”
“I was a whole person before you,” she told him after their wedding.
“You are lucky I like you.”
He laughed.
Now he cried.
Then laughed again.
The next morning, he drove to the Apache woman’s aunt’s property.
He had never been there.
That felt significant.
Until then, she always entered his world.
His ranch.
His grief.
His routines.
His child.
He had never entered hers.
Her aunt’s place was smaller.
Several horses.
Old pickup.
Wind chimes near the porch.
The Apache woman was cleaning tack when he arrived.
She looked surprised.
“What are you doing here?”
“I came to ask something.”
She waited.
He stepped closer.
“Can I kiss you without it becoming a promise I’m not ready to make?”
She stared.
Then laughed.
“That might be the least romantic thing anyone has ever said to me.”
“I practiced.”
“That makes it worse.”