I had missed the moment. Maybe she’d been expecting it, who knows. I’d been seconds away; seconds, and a lifetime. I often think if I’d asked, now we’d have two kids and a house with no view, who knows—I wouldn’t need the view, because I’d have her to look at; the kids, too. Instead, I’m some schmuck who’s alone in his house at fifty-three, looking down at an unquiet ocean.… So I didn’t ask. I was too scared, or broken, or bent.
