“It’s a work of art. It’s one of a kind. You can’t put a price on things like that.”

“And yet someone did.” He thought his droll remark might undercut the tension in the room, but Chloe’s fury only escalated.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Nothing. It was a lovely idea. I just think that whenever you consider spending that much money-whether it’s for a gift for me or something for the house-we should talk about it.”

“You don’t like it,” she wailed.

And because this was back when Dale still lied to spare his wife’s feelings, he swore that he did. But Chloe was not stupid. She realized that she had erred, made one of those mistakes in judgment that revealed the gap between her roots and her aspirations. Brought up in Colorado, in hardscrabble circumstances, Chloe was terrified of being seen as tacky or déclassé. Her solution had been to study newspapers and certain magazines, then throw money at the things she thought could transform her into a natural-born member of the upper middle class. Nine times out of ten, she got it right, winning praise for her clothes, her hair, and especially the house. But every now and then she suffered a costly misstep, a bitter reminder that she was faking it. Since the divorce it had been a relief to hear of such things secondhand, usually through Kat. Once, just once, Dale had stepped in and warned Chloe that aboveground swimming pools were banned by Glendale ’s covenants. (And how glad he was to have that excuse, rather than be faced with trying to explain to Chloe the real reasons they were undesirable.) Otherwise he no longer had to pay the price, figuratively or literally, for Chloe’s errors in judgment.

“I told you to wait in the hall,” Chloe said, coming into the kitchen as if she had been looking for him everywhere, mail in her hand.

“I always liked the view from here.” He pointed to the huge picture window in the kitchen’s dining alcove. It framed a deceptively bucolic scene-a meadow sloping down toward a creek, the fringe of trees that Kat had insisted on calling “the woods.” This house was probably the only place in Glendale where a man could look out a window and see something other than another house. Although developing the property would have meant a big windfall, he had always been secretly glad that the Muhlys and the Snyders wouldn’t sell. Kat would have grieved so to see this view spoiled. Kat. Kat. He should have realized that just coming to this house would be like entering a minefield. She was everywhere, even in this redone kitchen. He felt sorry for Chloe, alone here with so many ghosts and echoes. It would drive him mad. Madder.

“Will this do?”

The photograph Chloe had chosen was a class portrait, possibly Kat’s yearbook shot. Dale would have preferred something that wasn’t so obviously airbrushed; the very fact of alteration seemed to suggest that Kat had needed it, which she had not. But the photo was suitable, he supposed. He felt a sudden desire to reach out to Chloe, to find some kind of rapprochement. They had lost their daughter. They were in this together. They would need each other, going forward, to survive. Two people, left alone by some cataclysm, just like Kat’s poem for graduation.

“She looked more like you every year.”

“Really? All I see is my hair. Her face is yours-actually-” She stopped, unusual for Chloe, who never worried about how her words landed.

“What?”

“She looks like Glen to me. I know you don’t like to hear that, but it’s true. His face is just a little rounder. Gentler.”

“My brother’s face,” Dale said, “has not been hampered by thought or stress. Instead of getting Botox, maybe more women should just smoke marijuana every day of their lives. While living off their parents, of course.”

“You’re too hard on Glen,” Chloe said. “Always have been. It wasn’t easy being your brother. Not just your brother but your twin, for God’s sake. I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy.”

But I’m your worst enemy.

“I don’t see how being my brother was such a disadvantage. I was the one who was told I couldn’t go to Stanford because my father thought it was unfair for me to go to private school across the country while Glen was at College Park.”

“And you let Glen know just how much you resented him for it.”

“You two always were thick as thieves.”

“Thick as losers, you mean. That’s what we had in common. We were the only underachievers in the bunch. Even your mom, sweet as she was, made me feel scattered and useless.”

“You raised Kat, and she was lovely. If you never did another thing, Chloe, what you did with our daughter would be a greater accomplishment than most people ever know in their lives.”

To his astonishment, Chloe put her arms around him and began to cry, but not in the frightening, rage-filled way he remembered. She cried silently, her body heaving with tears, and he started to cry, too. He had cried frequently over the past three days, but this was different somehow. The grief was powerful yet pure. For a moment he was free of the desire to redress or avenge, to somehow fix what had happened.

But just as quickly Chloe broke the embrace, as if embarrassed to have dropped her guard in front of Dale. Disoriented, she began fanning herself with the envelopes she still clutched in one hand, then patted her cheeks with them.

“Oh, shit, look at me-I’m trying to dry my eyes with the mail.” She sat at the table and slid a letter opener through one. “That reminds me-you didn’t pay child support this month.”

“I’m sorry. I had meant to bring the check Friday night, when I came to take Kat out to dinner.” Despite the traditional every-other-weekend custody arrangement, Kat seldom spent full weekends with her father anymore, given the demanding social life of a high-school senior. So Dale came out every Friday for dinner and talked to her by phone almost every evening.

“Do you have your checkbook with you now?”

“No-why?”

“For the check.”

“What check?”

Chloe’s voice was patient, practical. “The June child support.”

“I’ve never examined this part of our separation agreement, but I have to think that child support ceases when the child is dead, Chloe.”

“The check was due on the first. I agreed you could bring it out Friday, the fourth, rather than risk it getting delayed in the mail. But you owed me that money as of the first.”

“I cannot believe you are busting my balls this way. Our daughter is dead, and all you care about is extracting more money from me.”

“I just want what I’m entitled to. I’m sorry I don’t have the option of being so pure in my grief, Dale. But I have bills.” She waved the envelopes at him, then began tossing them at his feet one by one. “Utility. Water. Credit card-no, wait, that’s a new credit card application, because that’s one part of the world that finds a forty-five-year-old woman desirable: credit card companies. Oh, the Glendale Association-for the services and clubs I don’t even use. And-what the fuck is this?”

“Your fur-storage bill?”

“Shut up, Dale. This is…this is…” She flapped it weakly, but all Dale saw was a plain white envelope, addressed in an elaborate handwriting, almost like calligraphy.

“Maybe it’s a note of condolence,” he said.

“It’s for Kat.”

He took it from Chloe, turning it over in his hand. “I’m sure it’s some school thing. It’s postmarked Friday morning. It was mailed…before. Certainly before the sender knew.”

When Dale opened it, a single page fell out: “I ask only that the truth be told.” The word “only” had been crossed out with a single pen stroke, and it was signed in the same blue ink: “Love, Perri.”