Part 2

I stopped the moment I saw the nursery.

The pale yellow walls I had painted myself were visible from the hallway, along with the white crib Ethan and I had put together two weekends earlier. My chest tightened so quickly I had to grab the edge of the entry table. That room had been our private little world, the one place where I allowed myself to believe everything would be okay. I wasn’t ready to look at it. I wasn’t ready to breathe near it.

But Linda was already inside.

She stood in the middle of the room with a cardboard box, pulling folded baby blankets from the shelf and tossing them in carelessly. The small stuffed fox my sister had sent from Seattle landed upside down on top. She didn’t even notice me at first.

“Good,” she said over her shoulder, assuming Ethan had followed her in. “I’m clearing this out before Claire makes it worse for herself. Best not to dwell.”

For a second, I couldn’t process what I was seeing. Then the anger came—sharp, clean, cutting through the fog of grief.

“Get out,” I said.

Linda turned, startled, then irritated. “Excuse me?”

“Get out of that room. Right now.”