She was feeling short-tempered, and as she worked she found herself getting aggressive with the furniture, shoving chairs and end tables here and there so she could properly vacuum, getting so angry when Byron’s favorite chair wasn’t far enough out from the wall that she slammed the vacuum into its leg to move it aside. Then the vacuum made a crackling noise, a sure sign of crumbs underneath the chair, meaning Byron had been eating his late-night snacks there again. Dolly had spent two years of married life telling him to eat at the table; that he would so deliberately flout her made her teeth clench. And he still hadn’t made one move to paint the bathroom! Spent, she shut off the vacuum, sat down on the sofa, and buried her face in her hands.

She knew she was supposed to be happy, that she should be happy, with her lot in life. She had a handsome husband who provided her with all her material needs. She knew it was her job in return to provide him with a well-kept home, as well as with the support he needed in order to conquer the world of work and continue providing for her and the children they were supposed to have. That was what everybody said, anyway, and, when she was in high school, that was what she and her friends had always discussed and expected—except when they’d discussed the things they might do if they could. Dolly had wanted to become a pilot, Jane a doctor. But they had yearned for husbands and children, too, and knew in their hearts that it was impossible for both dreams to come true. So they had pursued the more acceptable choice.

But now Dolly couldn’t seem to stop herself from asking, Is this it? Is this my life?

After her first set of flight lessons, she had in no way imagined that she would never again fly an airplane. And, try as she might, she couldn’t seem to resign herself.

Yesterday, when Dolly was on the porch of the Mickelson house with JJ, the depth of his eyes, the way he had looked at her, had seemed to reveal that life could be a sonata; she’d been so busy plunking out “Three Blind Mice” that she hadn’t even stopped to wonder over other possibilities. Looking in Byron’s eyes had always been like standing on the shore of a calm lake: pleasant, but inscrutable. You knew there were things under the surface, but the glint of the sun kept you from seeing anything but the blue calm. And she had allowed Byron to define her world—from the time she was twelve years old, really! Now that she’d seen a kaleidoscope of passionate possibilities, she feared what she might do.