Chapter 3

He paused, carefully choosing his words. "The client will hold us accountable. The contractual penalties will probably be between $180,000 and $225,000. Your husband will most likely be blacklisted across the industry."

$225,000 dollars.

That was the project Houston had spent six solid months working on. It was also what we'd been counting on to keep up with our mortgage payments.

Only one person remained ahead of me at the ticket gate. I pulled my suitcase forward a step.

"Danielle? Are you still there?"

A station employee waved me over. "Excuse me, ma'am. Please show me your ticket."

I stood there, clutching the ticket in my left hand and holding my phone in my right.

The employee urged me again, "Please hurry. We're about to close the gate."

I closed my eyes for a moment. Then I crouched down, unzipped my suitcase, and pulled out my laptop.

Right there on the floor of the waiting hall, I connected to my phone's hotspot and logged into Houston's work account.

The backup file was enormous. The internet connection was painfully slow. The progress bar crept forward one increment at a time.

5%.

12%.

The station announcement rang out. "Passengers traveling on train K1782, please be advised that ticketing will close shortly."

34%.

I knelt on the cold tile floor, staring at the screen.

67%.

The indicator lights on the ticket gates switched from green to red.

89%.

"Ticketing has ended. Passengers who have not boarded must change their tickets."

100%. Transfer complete.

I closed my laptop and looked up at the gate, now firmly shut.

Beyond the metal barrier, the platform was empty. The train's red taillights were shrinking to a single point at the far end of the tracks.

Then the light disappeared.

My phone rang again. It was my aunt, Grace Delacruz.

"Danielle... your grandmother..." Her sobs poured through the speaker, sharp and broken. "Your grandmother's gone. She held on for so long. She kept looking toward the door, calling your name over and over. 'Danielle, why haven't you come home yet?'"

The phone slipped from my hand and landed face up on the tile. It didn't crack. The screen remained lit.

Aunt Grace's sobbing rose from the floor. The vast, empty waiting hall amplified her cries again and again until they blurred into a hollow, buzzing roar.

I sat on the floor, my open laptop in front of me and the closed ticket gates behind me.

I didn't cry. I just felt something inside me snap cleanly in two, without a sound.

I don't know how much time passed before I picked up my phone. A social media notification was waiting on the screen.

Houston had posted three minutes earlier. It was a photo of freshly roasted chestnuts, steam still rising from them.

The caption read: "Finally got my silly little junior the chestnuts she wanted. Looks like I'll be playing nurse at the hospital for the whole holiday. Haha."

Location: Daim.

I arranged Grandma Yvette's funeral by myself. I bought her a funeral outfit, arranged for the funeral home to handle the casket, and knelt beside her coffin, saying my final goodbye. Aunt Grace cried until she fainted halfway through. My cousin Damon rushed back from out of town to help with the funeral, but he stayed only one day before leaving again.

One of the women helping with the funeral brought over a cup of ginger tea. Her eyes swept across the area outside the funeral hall. "Where's your husband?"

"On a business trip."

"What kind of business trip is more important than his wife's grandmother dying?"

I didn't answer. I set the ginger tea beside the offering table and went back to arranging the flowers and cards for the service.

The woman looked as though she wanted to say more, but someone beside her pulled her away. Even after they'd walked several steps, I could still hear her muttering.

"She married so far from home, and in the end, her husband couldn't even come for the funeral."

That night, only Grandma Yvette's memorial portrait and I remained in the funeral hall.

My phone had been vibrating in my pocket all day, but I hadn't looked at it. Only when everything around me had finally gone quiet did I take it out.

There were forty-seven messages from Houston, spanning yesterday and today.

The first few were relatively normal.

[Danielle, I just found out about your grandmother.]

[Why didn't you tell me sooner?]

[I'll book a ticket home right away.]

Then his messages became more frantic.

[Why aren't you answering your phone? Don't carry all of this alone.]

His final message was a voice note. His voice sounded panicked.

"Honey, I'm sorry. Please don't scare me like this. We'll deal with everything together when I get back."

I switched off my phone and removed the SIM card.

Then I reached into the bottom of my suitcase and pulled out a black plastic bag. Inside were some of Houston's seasonal clothes that I'd packed on a whim before leaving: a gray jacket, two ties, and his favorite plaid shirt.