The first time Rusty had told me that he loved me we’d been in his car, driving to his parents’ house for a dinner party, when we were at a stoplight and I’d garnered the nerve to ask him about his old girlfriend. “So, really,” I’d asked, “what’s the difference between Olivia and me?”

He’d turned to me, his hand resting lightly and casually on the steering wheel. “The difference is that I didn’t love her.” Then he’d smiled that charming smile and turned his gaze away from me to the road, the road that took us to his parents and a future together.

I knew it wasn’t exactly the same as saying “I love you,” but it was enough for me then.

And slowly through our dating he’d shown me his feelings.

I’d lived in a one-bedroom apartment in Buckhead. It was an ancient building, drafty and tiny, but it was all I could afford on my salary working in the High Museum absorbing art history while shuffling papers and memberships. My passion for my job was more important than my passion for a higher paycheck, which Rusty hadn’t understood.

I painted the plaster walls a creamy vanilla and hung framed reproduction posters and postcards of famous artwork. I scoured flea markets and antique marts for beautiful quilts and sheer curtains. I found mismatched plates and cups and refused Mother’s offer of unused family china. When I splurged on anything, it was pillows. I loved the purest down pillows piled all over my bed.

One February, I succumbed to something I’d always bragged that I’d never had: the flu. My body felt invaded and not-mine, as if I’d somehow given permission for something else to take residence in me while I shivered and ached. Time took on an odd dimension, sometimes moving too slowly, and then I’d lose hours to some fogged memory of sleep and vivid dreams of water and ice and fire.

Rusty had come to me in the middle of this disorientation. He’d entered my room and I’d rolled over to see him, grateful for his presence in a way I’d never been before. He sat on the side of the bed and placed his cold hand on top of my forehead, pressed lightly. His voice was soft. “Oh, you poor thing. You’re burning up. I’m gonna get you some Advil, and make you eat some soup your mother sent with me.”

I attempted to sit up, but the room spun as if I were on a hyperspeed merry-go-round. I slumped back into the pillows. “Oh, Rusty, you’re so sweet. Look, that painting is moving.” The Matisse Flowers in a Pitcher poster across the room blurred into a mass of colors and kaleidoscope confusion.