I took stock.
The marriage was in better shape than it had been in October. Not good shape, not healed shape — better shape. The specific ways it was better: Nathan and I were talking more, and the conversations had a quality of actual exchange rather than the managed-communication-around-hard-things quality they’d developed. He was making fewer unilateral decisions; I was raising concerns sooner rather than letting them compound. Elaine was, with some consistency, something that was his relationship to navigate rather than a joint project I was co-managing.
These things are not large. They are the correct size for one quarter of changed behavior, which is what we had.
I found myself, in January, experiencing a feeling I hadn’t quite named before: something like cautious investment. Not hope exactly — hope has a reaching quality, a leaning forward. This was more like: I am paying attention to this, and I am willing to continue paying attention, and what I find in the next few months will tell me something important.
Priya called on a January Sunday. She was in the middle of a long walk and talking through earbuds, her voice arriving slightly breathless and with the ambient sound of wind.
“How are you?” she asked.
“I’m okay,” I said. “Actually okay, not the way I usually say okay.”
“Yeah?” I could hear her smile. “What does actually okay look like?”
“Like I’m not braced for the next thing.”
“That’s significant.”
“I think so.” I paused. “I’ve been braced for so long that not being braced feels strange. Like I keep waiting to need to be braced again.”