Chapter 2 - The First Thing He Asked| Seven days earlier, Claire had been standing in the kitchen cutting strawberries when the hospital called.
It was 4:12 p.m.
She remembered the time because Sophie had been due home from a friend's house at five, and Claire had been wondering whether there was enough milk for breakfast.
The woman on the phone spoke calmly, the way people did when they were trained to deliver news that could split a life into before and after.
“Mrs. DeLuca, I'm calling from St. Matthew's Medical Center. Your husband has been involved in a vehicle accident.”
Claire dropped the knife.
“Is Adrian all right?”
“He is receiving treatment. There were three occupants in the vehicle.”
Three.
The number registered before the names did.
“Who else was in the car?”
“Your daughter, Sophie, and a woman named Vivian Cole.”
For one irrational moment, Claire wondered whether the hospital had made a mistake. Vivian had no reason to be in Adrian's vehicle while he was supposed to be taking Sophie home.
“Where is my daughter?”
The woman paused.
“Mrs. DeLuca, I need you to come to the hospital immediately.”
“Tell me where she is.”
“Please come as soon as you can.”
Claire didn't remember hanging up. She remembered the strawberries scattered across the counter, the knife on the floor, and the sudden inability to draw a full breath.
At the hospital, a nurse led her into a consultation room.
Adrian had suffered several fractures and a concussion. Vivian had injuries that required treatment, but she was expected to recover.
Then Claire asked about Sophie.
The doctor took off his glasses.
“We did everything we could.”
“No.”
“I'm very sorry.”
“No, she's seven.”
The doctor reached for a box of tissues.
Claire pushed it away.
“She has a school project due Friday. She doesn't even know how to tie her shoes properly. You can't tell me she's gone.”
The doctor didn't answer.
He didn't need to.
Claire found Sophie in a private room, wrapped in a white blanket. The little girl looked as if she were sleeping after an exhausting day.
Claire sat beside her and took her hand.
“Baby, I'm here.”
There was no response.
“I'm sorry I wasn't in the car with you.”
She stroked Sophie's hair, careful around the small medical dressing near her temple.
“I should have come to get you myself. We could have stopped for ice cream. You could have told me about school.”
Her voice broke.
“I promised we'd make pasta tonight.”
She stayed until a nurse finally asked whether she needed someone to call a relative.
Claire said no.
There was no one she wanted except the little girl who could no longer answer her.
Adrian remained unconscious for three days.
Claire sat beside his bed, slept in an uncomfortable chair, and answered calls from relatives who wanted updates. She told herself that once he woke, they would grieve together. Whatever had been wrong with their marriage, Sophie had belonged to both of them.
On the third morning, Adrian's fingers moved.
His eyelids fluttered.
Claire stood so quickly that her chair scraped against the floor.
“Adrian?”
He opened his eyes, confused by the hospital lights.
“Claire?”
“I'm here.”
He swallowed and tried to sit up.
“Where am I?”
“St. Matthew's. You were in an accident.”
His breathing quickened.
“Vivian?”
Claire stared at him.
“What?”
“Vivian. Is she—”
“She's alive.”
His shoulders relaxed.
It was small. Almost invisible. But Claire saw it.
Before he asked about his own injuries, before he asked what had happened, before he asked where his daughter was, he had needed to know that Vivian had survived.
Claire felt something inside her crack.
“Sophie is dead,” she said.
Adrian stopped moving.
For a moment, his face was empty.
Then he began shaking his head.
“No.”
“She died in the accident.”
“No. No, she was—”
“She was seven years old, Adrian.”
He covered his face with both hands.
“Sophie.”
He said her name over and over, as if repetition could reverse the past.
Claire watched him cry.
And because she had loved him for nine years, a part of her wanted to reach for him.
But she remembered the way his shoulders had relaxed when he heard Vivian was alive.
She remembered how long it had taken him to ask about their daughter.
She stood.
“Where are you going?” he asked through his tears.
“Home.”
“Claire, please. Don't leave me.”
She looked at him for a long moment.
“You were not alone when you made your choices, Adrian. You only want me beside you now that you have to live with them.”
Then she walked out.
May you like
He called her name, but she did not turn around.
For the first time since their wedding, Claire no longer knew whether she was leaving a wounded husband behind or escaping a man she had never truly known.
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