I knew because several birthday cards were nearby.
“You said she died before we got married.”
“She did.”
“How would she know my name?”
Daniel looked at the envelope as though it frightened him.
Then he slowly met my eyes.
“Because you met her.”
I stared at him.
“No, I didn’t.”
“Yes,” he whispered.
“You just don’t remember.”
-END OF Chapter 2–Part 3 of 5
“I would remember meeting your dying sister.”
My voice echoed strangely in the garage.
Daniel didn’t argue.
Instead, he looked toward the box.
“It was one time.”
“Where?”
“The bookstore where you worked.”
Something shifted in my memory.
Before Daniel and I married, I had worked in a tiny independent bookstore near the university.
I remembered hundreds of faces.
Students.
Retired professors.
Mothers dragging bored children through the aisles.
A young woman in a knitted blue cap came vaguely to mind.
But memory is dangerous when someone gives it instructions.
