had been hard, she knew. There were things he no longer did, like drive after drinking. None of the bad things he stopped seemed to make him feel any better. It was as though he were losing the only things that supported him.
I suppose I could take a half day, she said.
They drove to Sandy’s Donuts, where the doughnuts were always fresh. They drank coffee and picked at the warm dough. A man who was seated alone at the next table smiled at Arlene and addressed Mark.
Are you treating her good?
The man was just making morning conversation. From his tone, Arlene guessed that maybe he did not have a woman at home. She knew he meant only that Mark was lucky to have a devoted, smiling wife. But Mark appeared to have been felled by the interaction. They finished their breakfast in gloomy silence.
On their way home Mark asked Arlene if she minded if he stopped and talked to Father Bert at the church. He asked if she could come around and pick him up afterward. She said no problem and went home to wait for his call.
Later Father Bert would tell Arlene that Mark asked him, Should I go to a hospital? I’m feeling so down.
Father Bert shook his head. Go home, he said, get yourself some rest.
Outside the church windows, tall stalks of Russian sage and rich magenta hollyhocks and purple coneflowers rose against the blue sky. There were also hostas in the priest’s personal flower garden, the lushest and greenest Mark had ever seen. It was as though they were lit from within.
Father, Mark said, pointing at the flowers, do you think heaven looks like that?
Father Bert nodded and smiled. I can only imagine, he said.
Later, on their deck, Arlene said, You look so low. Please, just tell me what you are thinking and feeling.
Mark shook his head. He said he couldn’t. He wanted to go to an afternoon Mass with Father Bert at the nursing home and asked if she wanted to join him. But Arlene couldn’t. She had stayed home the whole morning. She had to go to work. She felt okay leaving him. He was going to Mass and, later that night, he planned to attend a meeting.
In the evening she came home to find Mark napping in the bedroom. He woke up, startled. His eyes were wide and scared. What’s wrong, what’s happened? he said.
Nothing, Arlene said, I was just checking on you.
Lene?
Yes?
Come lie with me awhile.
She went to him. She laid herself beside him. She tried to be exactly what he needed in the moment, not too much or too little. When she heard his body fall into the rhythm of sleep she got up so he could stretch himself out. She moved to the living room and dozed on the couch. A little bit later he got up in a hurry and gave her a quick kiss good-bye. He was running late. Arlene told him to have a good meeting and that she loved him.
Around midnight she woke on the couch, having fallen asleep there. Mark wasn’t home. She was only slightly concerned because people often went out for coffee after meetings. She hoped he was having a helpful conversation with one of the members. She fell back asleep and woke for good around five. The shock of not finding Mark beside her left her colder than any Fargo winter. At this point she began to tremble. She wanted to call her brother, who knew some people who went to the same meeting. But it was too early so she waited, drinking coffee and staring at the clock and praying to God. At seven, she called her brother and he called some of the members. They told him Mark had not made it to the meeting.
Arlene’s stomach sank. Her new hope was that he had parked somewhere and drunk until he passed out. He’d wake up and come home any minute now. But he had stopped drinking when he was driving. He had made that concession for her, because he knew how important his life was to her.
She called the Fargo Police Department, the hospital, and the jail. She waited some more, and then she woke her daughter.
Maggie startled at the trembling touch of her mother’s hand. She knew. Right away she knew. Her dad had never once not come home. Staying out all night was not one of the wrong things he did. She tried to feel in her heart