Chapter 3 - THE WOMAN I USED TO BE
Three days after the gala, I visited the old office of the Harbor Children's Initiative.
It occupied the second floor of a converted townhouse on West Twenty-Third Street.
The elevator was still unreliable.
The hallway still smelled of coffee and printer toner.
And the receptionist, Mrs. Alvarez, still kept peppermint candies in a glass bowl beside the sign-in sheet.
She looked up.
Then gasped.
“Claire?”
I smiled.
“Hello, Rosa.”
She came around the desk and hugged me.
“Look at you!”
I laughed.
“It's been a while.”
“Six years.”
The number embarrassed me.
I had once spent sixty hours a week in that building.
Now I couldn't remember the last time I'd visited.
Rosa led me upstairs.
My former supervisor, Margaret Ellis, stood beside a conference table covered with grant applications.
She was seventy now, with white hair and reading glasses hanging from a chain.
When she saw me, her expression softened.
“Well,” she said. “The prodigal fundraiser returns.”
I hugged her.
Then cried.
It happened so suddenly that I couldn't stop it.
Margaret held me until I could breathe.
When we finally sat down, I told her I had been thinking about returning to nonprofit work.
She listened without interrupting.
Then said, “You never stopped being good at it.”
“I haven't worked in six years.”
“You haven't worked here in six years. That's different.”
I smiled faintly.
Margaret opened a folder.
“We're developing a transitional housing program for families displaced by medical emergencies. The funding structure is complicated.”
I leaned forward.
Within ten minutes, I was asking questions.
Within twenty, I had identified two weaknesses in the budget.
Within forty, I had filled three pages with notes.
Margaret watched me.
Then smiled.
“There she is.”
I looked up.
“Who?”
“The woman I hired.”
For the first time in years, I felt useful in a way that had nothing to do with making Daniel look successful.
That afternoon, Margaret mentioned Julian Hart's foundation.
“He's been asking about our expansion,” she said.
“Has he?”
“Yes. Apparently he remembers your old work.”
I looked down.
Margaret studied me.
“Claire, may I ask something personal?”
I nodded.
“Are you happy?”
I opened my mouth.
Then closed it.
I had rehearsed answers for that question.
Of course.
We're busy.
Daniel works hard.
We're fortunate.
Instead, I whispered, “I don't know.”
Margaret reached across the table.
“Then perhaps that's where you begin.”
When I returned home, Daniel was waiting in the living room.
He held my old nonprofit folder.
“Where have you been?”
I looked at the folder.
“How did you get that?”
“It was on the desk.”
“In my study.”
“In our apartment.”
I stared at him.
Daniel opened the folder.
“Why are you contacting Hart's foundation?”
I felt the blood drain from my face.
“How do you know I contacted them?”
He didn't answer.
Then I noticed a printed email tucked between the pages.
An email I'd sent from my personal account that morning.
May you like
Daniel had been reading my correspondence.
And he wasn't even pretending otherwise.
