Their renewed closeness brings her back to the moment that once began those six months of silence.
He stood with his coat over his arm and asked whether he should stay. She smoothed a fold in his sleeve, a small, precise movement in place of an answer, and let him go.
Later, she told herself he had simply failed to understand. She wrote a whole page of reasons she had learned to live this way, then crossed them out one by one. No reason could change the essential thing: she wanted him to stay but did not ask. Afterwards, she blamed him for failing to guess.
She does not demand his return as a reward for honesty. He does not have to take her back for her to acknowledge her share of the blame.
The truth arrived late. And it arrived wearing her name.