Marjorie stopped sitting on her porch.
At first, I blamed the weather.
Then the days cooled, and her chair remained empty.
Whenever I waved through the window, Owen would quietly pull the curtain shut.
He never glared at me. He never made an angry gesture. Somehow, that calm movement unsettled me more than open hostility would have.
One evening, I saw him carrying a cardboard box toward his car.
“Doing some cleaning?” I asked.
“Marjorie has too much clutter,” he replied.
“She loves her things.”
“She gets tired easily now.”
His tone was mild, but the conversation ended there. He placed the box in his trunk and closed it before I could see what was inside.
Then one morning, I saw Marjorie outside for less than a minute.
She stood near the rose bushes in a pale nightgown, though the air was cold enough for a coat.
She looked thinner.
