He flipped back to his calendar. “Deck construction will start once we’re done in Frisco. Should be about another two weeks, and then window installation in three. Feel free to start ripping apart the inside now that your foundation is reinforced.”

Now that your foundation is reinforced.

The phrase ran through my head as we finished the scheduling talk and I walked him to the door.

Standing in the living room a few minutes later, I looked out over the ocean through the open door. The breeze was heavy with salt and humidity but better than the stagnant air inside the house.

A few weeks and I’d have my deck back instead of this rough, wooden X nailed into the lower portion of the doorway baby gate-style. Like I was going to forget there wasn’t a deck there and step into nothingness.

But the pilings were in, ready to support what came next.

The house’s foundation was done. Mine still felt cracked.

“Hey,” Sam said as she came down the stairs, twisting her hair into a ponytail. “Are you ready?”

I glanced at the tiny cassette recorder that rested on the counter next to the refrigerator and cringed.

Tuesday had been brutal. Turned out that the base of complicated grief therapy was telling the story of Will’s death over and over…then listening to myself tell it every single day on that damned cassette player, only to record it again the following week and so on. It was supposed to lessen the emotional impact, which seemed rather like showering before a tsunami. Or, in my case, like the showering actually brought on the tsunami. I still sucked at the now visualize yourself putting the memory away, just like you’re putting away the tape recorder part of the instructions.

“I don’t want to.” Instead, I poured another cup of coffee.

“Right, and you know that I respect your choices, so I’ll give you one.” Sam hopped up onto the kitchen counter next to the tape recorder. “I can hit play on this one or the one I recorded on my phone before I realized we were using that slice of ancient technology.”

That earned her a little side-eye.

“Support person, remember? So we listen, and then you get to pick your reward!”

“Already done.” I pointed to the hardback of Mrs. Dalloway that rested on the kitchen counter, my bookmark peeking from about midway through the novel.

“Virginia Woolf is not a reward. She’s a homework assignment,” she challenged.

“I happen to love Virginia Woolf. I’m actually about three quarters through all of her books, I’ll have you know, you giant math nerd.” I sent her a face that made her laugh.

“Uh-huh.” She muttered something about English majors as she reached into the drawer to her left and pulled out pamphlets. “We’ve already done pedicures and the aquarium—”