Chiyo remembered her mother’s tears—and her own. “And while we’re sorting through paperwork, we’re pulling out photos, aren’t we? Spreading them around at home. A natural thing to do. Someone dies and we begin to sift through envelopes and boxes. Or create an album as a tribute. A woman in one of my fitness classes told me she covered an entire wall in her den with photos of her late husband, ceiling to floor. I thought that was so sad, but maybe we all do the same in more controlled ways. We might move a framed photo from a bedroom dresser to a prominent living-room shelf, where it can be seen while we wander aimlessly around the house.” She was thinking of the photo she’d framed, now on her kitchen shelf. A head-and-shoulders shot of her mother, who’d been in her forties at the time, glistening black hair, eyes watchful, challenging the person behind the camera. Chiyo had no idea who had taken the picture.

Others were nodding, but not Gwen. No framed photo in my house, she was thinking. Any photo of Brigg that had once lain around was disposed of after the boys left, the day I sat on the stoop and smoked two cigarettes. Gone. Every photo went into the trash. I hold enough of him in visual memory to last a lifetime. Maybe someday, I’ll be able to create one kind thought about him. Or even two. Maybe I have to start thinking of kindness. Of why I married him in the first place.

Not now. Maybe not ever. All the reasons, all the reasoning, so tangled up.

Had Brigg hated her? Had he hated himself? The only place she had been safe from his shouts, from the summoning clang of the bell, was on the toilet seat in the downstairs bathroom. She stifled a sob, thinking of this now. She hadn’t been able to get away from him, but she had learned how to get away from his voice and the bell. And somehow, he excused her when he demanded to know why she hadn’t come immediately and she told him she’d been in the bathroom. What he didn’t know was that she took a novel in there and sat on the toilet seat and read half an hour at a time. If the novel was well written, she was able to forget him during those thirty minutes.

Allam caught her change of mood and looked at her quizzically. She looked away. Eventually, if he wanted to hear, she’d share that, too. But why bring up every detail? Maybe she really could move on. Step away.

“What about groups?” Addie asked, quite suddenly. “Did anyone join groups? Besides this one, I mean.”

“Not really,” said Hazzley. “But there are other groups out there, let me tell you. Two women I know belong to a widows’ group. When the Greenley Orchestra came to town a few years ago for their annual performance at the Belle, I sat alone, four rows behind the widows. I could hear them laughing, and I longed to be part of their group. But I wasn’t eligible because Lew was still alive. He was supposed to be with me, but he bowed out at the last minute. I ended up going alone because there was no time to contact anyone else. The situation was bizarre, now that I think of it. There I was, next to an empty seat, wanting to sit with the widows. I couldn’t because my husband was dying but not dead. I felt so guilty about thinking that. But they didn’t even know I was there. Most of them didn’t know me anyway. We’re so human, so damned vulnerable. That’s what I was at the time. Vulnerable.”