Chapter 3

Professor Brandt's second reminder arrived before lunch.

We would be delighted to have your decision, Dr. Stone. Your work on portable tissue-repair scaffolds is precisely what our field program needs.

Dr. Stone. Not Mrs. Romano. Not someone's dependent.

I accepted before courage could turn back into caution.

Then I went home to pack.

There wasn't much. Most of my books and clothes were already in university accommodation. At the house, I filled a suitcase and almost forgot the linen box beneath my side of the bed.

Inside were photographs from the studio I had booked every month. I used to think a record of our marriage might help us become the couple I saw in other people's pictures.

There I was, leaning toward him. There he was, checking his watch. A birthday, a winter holiday, an anniversary: forty-eight small proofs that a camera could put two people together without making them close.

I dropped the box into the wastebasket.

For the next fortnight, my days belonged to dissertation corrections, lab handovers, and the long forms required to move a life abroad.

Vincent called during a research meeting.

"I'm at the south gate."

I stared at the phone. He had never collected me from campus before.

In his car, he waited until I fastened my seat belt.

"The housekeeper says you're hardly there."

"I'm finishing things."

"Diana thinks she's upset you. She says she'll move out next month."

"She can stay."

His hands shifted on the wheel.

"Katherine."

"It really doesn't matter."

I closed my eyes. At first it was a way to end the conversation. Then I slept, too tired even to dream about what he might have said.

Ten days before my flight, I found myself buying candied ginger because the smell of almost everything else made me ill.

At the checkout, I counted backward.

That evening I bought a test from a pharmacy where nobody knew my married name.

Two lines appeared before I had finished reading the instructions.

The obstetrician dated the pregnancy at twelve weeks. She talked about measurements and appointments while I stared at a small flicker on the screen.

A heartbeat.

My illness in February. The tablets I had swallowed and sometimes failed to keep down. Our last uninterrupted night, before Diana returned.

At twenty-four, I had learned how to leave a husband. I had no idea how to become a mother alone.

Outside the examination room, I dialed Vincent.

His ringtone answered from the other end of the corridor.

I stepped behind a half-open stairwell door.

Diana stood beside him, his coat around her shoulders. A clinician was giving her instructions.

"Rest, no strenuous activity, and avoid intercourse until your review."

Vincent nodded.

"I'll see that she follows it."

I looked down at the little printout in my hand. On the other side of the door, Diana held one too.

I ended the call.

I tried to leave too quickly and collided with a nurse coming around the corner. Folders scattered. I crouched to gather them, my own scan crushed inside my fist.

"Katherine?"

Vincent's shoes stopped beside the papers.

"What are you doing here?"

"An upset stomach."

Diana came to his side.

"You poor thing. Vincent says you forget to eat."

Her scan remained visible between two polished fingers.

Vincent followed my gaze.

"This isn't—"

"We agreed," Diana said softly.

He turned toward her.

"Katherine, let me explain."

Diana touched his arm again. "You gave me your word."

Something closed in his face. Whatever he meant to tell me stayed where it was.

I stood, handed the nurse her folders, and walked toward the lift. Vincent moved after me. Diana called him back.

As the doors narrowed, I saw him stop.

Outside, I sat on a bench with my acceptance email open and one hand over the place where a stranger was growing inside me.

I had a flight. A fellowship. An address in another country.

For the first time since planning my escape, none of those things felt like somewhere I could go.