I did not move to the door immediately. I took a breath the way James had once told me to do before any difficult conversation. slow, deliberate, complete. I let them knock twice before I answered. They were dressed carefully. Cynthia in a soft blue sweater, her hair down. She usually wore it pulled back, and I noticed the change immediately, the way it was meant to be noticed, as a signal of openness, of vulnerability, of please let us in.
Derek was in the gray shirt I had given him for Christmas 2 years ago, and the recognition of that detail produced in me a feeling I refused to follow. ‘Mom,’ Derek said, ‘we just want to talk.’ I stepped back from the doorway. They came inside. We sat in the living room, my living room, with Roland’s bookshelves and the photograph above the mantle and the rug I had bought in Arizona in 1998.