Matthew grabbed her arm and—more than the fear of how she’d behaved with the man in the woods who could have assaulted her, more than that she’d pretty much encouraged him to do so, more than the thug who’d shoved her to the ground and stolen her bag and her wallet and her phone with the number that Leda could dial if she ever changed her mind and came back to them—Matthew’s grip made her furious.

“Give me the keys,” Sarah insisted, shaking off his grip.

“Hang on,” Matthew said.

Kiki and Arman picked up their pace and passed them by, obviously aware of their arguing.

“Just give them to me,” Sarah whispered as they approached the cars. “There’s room for you in their front seat.”

“Look.” Matthew stopped her, putting his hands on her shoulders. “You need—” He paused, as if phrasing mattered. As if he were measuring out gin and scooping up ice and thinking about how, if he handled this correctly, they could all get home without tension here and without any fighting in the car. They could get back to the house with enough time to shower, enough hours in the evening to mention the unexpected beauty of the lake, how good Sylvie was, how far Matthew had swum. They could reflect upon a perfect day as they sipped gin and tonics with lime.

“You need to settle down,” whispered Matthew.

Sarah kicked sand at Matthew’s feet. The kick was small, just a little spray of sand, but it proved he was right; she was acting like a child. But as she saw Kiki securing Sylvie in her car seat, as she saw this smart reaction—the right reaction—to her childish animosity toward Matthew, she felt a wave of not caring about anything. She felt grateful that Kiki was doing what she’d asked and that they were getting going quickly, but this gratitude was abstract. She was a great mother, Kiki, a natural. She was in the car, focused on her child. Aside from these somehow detached observations, Sarah felt only aggravation. She kept scanning the woods for the man. She wondered if he was watching. Then she noticed that the decrepit car was gone.

Her relief transformed into the sudden understanding that Matthew looked truly nervous. She knew he was disturbed by her unpredictability since the mugging, and it occurred to Sarah that he was perhaps not actually optimistic and centered, the way she’d always assumed. Maybe, contrary to what she and the old foreign man from the subway had agreed upon, people don’t actually change, and Matthew was still the young man she’d met when she was twenty years old, the one who’d been—up until right before they’d met—unable to speak in public. Maybe her husband was so agreeable and said yes so often not because he was magnanimous and hardworking but because he was driven by fear.

She brought her hand to Matthew’s cheek.

He shook his head. Then he unlocked the car.