Page 70 of The Space He Left
We were experts at this. We knew how to talk about our daughter. What we had forgotten was how to talk to each other. I found myself studying him when he wasn’t looking. The way his hands, so capable and strong, carefully cut Emma's pizza into tiny, manageable squares. The way he listened to her nonsensical stories with the same rapt attention he gave to construction blueprints. He laughed at one of her stories, a genuine, deep laugh that vibrated through the kitchen. It was the sound I’d fallen in love with, the sound that used to be the background music of my life. Hearing it now, in this kitchen, felt like a punch to the gut and a balm to my soul all at once. This was the man I had missed.
After Emma had eaten her fill and was covered in a fine sheen of tomato sauce, Jack automatically stood to clear the plates.
"I can get that," I said quickly.
"We can both get it," he replied, giving me a small, tentative smile. "Teamwork, right?"
We moved around the kitchen together, the familiar rhythm of cleaning up after a meal a ghostly echo of our old life. My hip brushed against his as I reached for the sponge, and we both froze for a fraction of a second before quickly moving apart. The air crackled with the memory of casual intimacy, a reminder of how far we still had to go. In that brief contact, my entire body remembered what it felt like to belong next to him.
A whole year of therapy and self-reflection couldn't erase the muscle memory of our marriage, nor the fact that I loved this man. I knew from his actions that he loved me too. I saw itin the way he pulled back, in the apology in his eyes - a silent acknowledgment that he understood the space between us, and that he was willing to wait for me to close it. In that moment of shared, awkward silence, I felt the first real flicker of hope that we might actually find our way back.
With the kitchen clean, we moved to the living room for Emma's bedtime routine. This was new territory. For the past year, "bedtime" had been my domain. Other than Emma’s birthday, Jack's visits had always ended before the bath-and-pajamas ritual began.
"I can handle this if you need to—" I started.
"I'd like to stay," he said, his voice quiet but firm. "If that's okay."
"Sure," I agreed, my heart doing a strange little flutter.
We read her a story together, taking turns with the pages of Goodnight Moon, her favorite story right now. I sat on one side of her, Jack on the other, our daughter cocooned between us. When Jack read the lines about the "quiet old lady who was whispering hush", he used the same soft, hushed voice he’d used when he’d read to me on nights I couldn't sleep.
I had to look away, a lump forming in my throat.
He noticed. I saw him glance at me, his expression full of a question he didn't dare ask. In that glance, I saw everything: his regret, his fear, but also the deep, aching love for the life we had built together, the one he was so desperate to be a part of again. He wasn't just here for Emma; he was here for me, too.
After tucking Emma into her crib, we stood in the hallway outside her room, the soft glow of her nightlight spilling into the darkness. The house was quiet now, the buffer of our daughter's presence gone.
"She's amazing," Jack whispered, his eyes still on her doorway.
"She is."
He turned to face me, his hands shoved deep into his pockets. "Thank you for this, Harper. For dinner. For… letting me stay."
"It was a good first step," I admitted. "But it was also… hard."
"I know." He finally met my eyes, and I saw the full weight of his regret, his hope, his exhaustion. "This is going to be a very long road, isn't it?"
"The longest," I confirmed.
He nodded, accepting it. He didn't try to argue, didn't try to promise a quick fix. He just stood there, accepting the consequences. "Okay," he said. "I should go."
I walked him to the door. He paused on the threshold, turning back to me.
"Next week?" he asked. "Same time?"
The question hung in the air, a fragile offering. He was asking for permission to hope, to believe that this wasn't a one-time event but the start of a new pattern.
I thought about the awkward silences, the charged moments, the painful reminders of what we’d lost. But I also thought about the look on Emma’s face when she saw her father at the dinner table. I thought about him remembering my favorite salad dressing.
"Yes," I said. "Next week. Same time."
A slow smile spread across Jack's face. It was the smile of a man who had been given a single drop of water after a year in the desert. "Goodnight, Harps. I love you."
"Goodnight, Jack."
I closed the door and leaned against it, listening to his truck start and drive away. The house felt empty again, but it was a different kind of emptiness. Not the sharp, lonely ache of the past year, but the quiet, echoing space where something new might have room to grow.
Chapter 25
