He unbuttoned his jacket, put a hand in his pocket. "Maybe it was too much too quickly. Maybe every flame burns out, I don't know. I'm sure some of the blame was mine. Maybe most. She wasn't my first wife. I'd gotten hitched in college- that one lasted less than a year; obviously I wasn't good at the matrimony thing. After we started living together, it was like ... something sputtered. No fights, just... no fire. Both of us were really into our work, we didn't spend much time together."

The beard hair under his lip vibrated a bit. "We never fought. She just seemed to lose interest. I think she lost interest first, but after a while it stopped bothering me. I felt I was living with a stranger. Maybe I had been all along."

The other hand went in a pocket. Now he was slouching. "So here I am, forty-one, working on my third. Happy honeymoon so far, but who knows?"

I noticed that he tended to shift the focus to himself. Self-centered, or an intentional distraction?

I said, "So Claire was really into her work. Did that ever change?"

"Not that I saw. But I wouldn't have known. We never talked about work. We never talked about anything. It was weird-one moment we're getting hitched, having hurricane sex, then we're each going about our business. I tried. I invited her to the office a couple of times, but she was always too busy. She never invited me to her lab. One time I dropped in on her anyway. What a zoo, all those drunks lurching around. She didn't seem happy to see me-like I was intruding. Eventually, we were avoiding each other completely. Easy to do when you're both working seventy hours a week. I'd get home when she was already asleep; she'd wake up early, be over at the hospital by the time I was in the shower. Only reason we stayed married for two years is each of us was too busy-or too lazy-to file the papers."

"Who ended up filing?" I said.

"Claire did. I remember the day she announced it to me. I came home late, but this time she was up, in bed doing a crossword puzzle. She pulls out a stack of papers, says, 'I thought it was about time, Joe. How do you feel about it?' I remember feeling relieved. But also hurt. Because she didn't even want to try to work it out. Also, for me it was the second time, and I was wondering if I'd ever pull off the whole relationship thing. I moved out, but she didn't actually file for six months."

"Any idea why?" said Milo.

"She said she hadn't gotten around to it."

"What was the financial agreement?" said Milo.