I didn’t read it that day. I put it on the counter and made myself some tea and watched the six o’clock news and I honestly just didn’t want to deal with it. That was a mistake.

I should have read it that Thursday, but I was tired and I trusted my daughter and I figured it was boring legal paperwork that I didn’t want to think about. So it sat on the counter for a week, then I moved it to the side table by the couch, and then I put it in the drawer in the kitchen because it was bothering me just sitting there.

And then three days ago my phone buzzed. New voicemail from David. I figured he was confirming Sunday dinner, we do a family dinner most Sundays, so I wasn’t even fully paying attention when I hit play. I was rinsing a bowl. She’s coming around on the paperwork. Once she signs, we list the house in spring. Don’t let your husband say anything Sunday.

I put the bowl down. I stood at the sink and I played it again.

I don’t know what I felt exactly. I want to say I was angry and I was, eventually, but the first thing was more like that feeling when you’re walking down stairs in the dark and you think there’s one more step and there isn’t. That lurching thing. Like the floor disappeared for a second. My brain was doing this thing where it kept trying to explain it away. Maybe it’s about a different house. Maybe I’m misunderstanding. Maybe Renee and her husband are selling their house. I played it two more times and I knew I wasn’t misunderstanding anything.