Thank you for reading Novella, my author newsletter, where I share original fiction, audio stories, and personal notes on reading and the writing life. You are receiving this newsletter because you signed up on my author website, the Random House website, or on Substack.
This is part 5 of the serialized story What Brings You Back Home. Go here to start at the beginning or pick up where you left off: Pick up where you left off: Part 1 / Part 2 / Part 3 / Part 4
Let’s say you have made a life together. Let’s say this took half a lifetime to accomplish. Let’s say that, after several years of trial and error, you met the one. You quickly disentangled yourself from previous entanglements, because it was obvious: him. You forged a bond. You lived together first to test the waters, though it turned out they didn’t need testing; the water was fine. It was more than fine.
You got married, had a child. Let’s say you were blessed with far more than you ever asked for—the career, the mostly happy life in a small town in California, the vacations to Canada and Oregon and Mexico. Let’s say the child was challenging, on account of her strong will, but she was happy and healthy, and you knew that stubborn nature would do her good, in the long run. You knew she would always stand up for herself. Also, even as a toddler, she had such a strong sense of justice, a kind of explosively righteous anger when she sensed someone—anyone—was being mistreated.
The husband was hard-working and funny and attentive, great in bed, and if you sometimes fought, you always came back together. There was no one you’d rather grow old with—really. Twenty years later, he was still the one.
Let’s say everything was going according to plan, and better. Let’s say you were happy. Genuinely happy. On a razor’s edge of happiness, holding your breath, thinking, “How can this last?”
Let’s say it didn’t.