“Okay. Thank you for your cooperation. I’ll be in touch.”

Now, I sat in the blue chair, waiting for Robert to come home. He’d been working late a lot; tonight was no different. Lately, we’d been like strangers, passing like ships in the night. I got to thinking about the day we met. I was still studying midwifery and running an art class out of Mom’s garage to make ends meet. Robert had been referred to the class by another student and, as an accountant, he wasn’t my typical clientele. He wasn’t a classic accountant; he was pretty boho, in fact. His jeans were ripped and his sideburns impressively long, and he had a psychedelic scarf tied haphazardly around his neck. It was only the bluish black dots on his cheeks and upper lip that gave him away. No one was clean-shaven back then. It was the seventies, and unless you had a corporate job, were prepubescent, or a woman, you had a mustache. I noticed Robert as I dashed from the garage back to the house for more chairs. I waved him in and when I returned, my regulars were sitting at the table, some already with lit spliffs in hand. But Robert was hovering inside the door, clearly out of place.

“You must be Robert,” I said.

“Yes.” He extended his hand, which was novel, as creative types tended to hug. “I’m looking for Gracie.”

“You’ve found her,” I said, suppressing a smile. Gracie? No one called me that. But I was willing to allow it. His awkwardness was charming and he was quite handsome, this accountant. Pam—the regular who had referred him—had mentioned he was handsome, but people rarely understood my type. And even if they did, Robert wasn’t it. Still, I got that funny feeling in my belly, the feeling commonly described as “butterflies,” though I thought it more like ripples in a pond after you throw a stone: hitting you hard in the center before gently radiating outward to the tips of your fingers and toes. The feeling continued throughout the class, getting stronger the closer I got to Robert, and stronger still when I leaned over him to examine his work and my breast brushed his back. It was hard to gauge if Robert felt the same; he was a diligent student, concentrating on his picture as though it were a math puzzle rather than a creative expression of himself. But the fact that he loitered after the class had ended had to be a good sign, I figured.

“Did you enjoy the class?” I asked as I washed up the paintbrushes.

“I did. Very … relaxing.”

I covered my mouth, but a snicker came out.

“What?” he asked.

“I’m sorry, but you didn’t look relaxed. In fact, you’re the first person I’ve seen who makes life drawing class look stressful.”

“Ah.” He grinned. “I’m good at making things look stressful. In my world, you get paid more for that.”

“Your world sounds dreadful.”

“It’s not so bad right now.”

Robert’s gaze lingered intentionally on mine. Wow. This accountant could turn on the charm. Who’d have guessed it? I waved to the last couple of students as they headed out.

“Maybe you’d like to stay for a while.” I held his eye as I reached for the red and black kimono that hung over the back of my chair. “Maybe—” I held the pause as long as I could. “—you could draw me.”

With hindsight, I was incredibly forward. Robert had acted like it was no big deal, but I could see from the way his hands trembled that he was terrified. I sat on the stool, the kimono draped over my most private parts, my body angled to the right and my feet tucked into the lower bar. I turned my head to face him and opened the kimono, just enough.

“Make sure you get the shape right before focusing on the detail,” I told him, trailing my fingertips down the side of my breast. “Start here with the curve of the breast and the hip, then the narrowness of the head and the ankles. Use as many strokes as you need—this is art not science. The only way to do a poor female form is to fail to celebrate her curves.…”

I paused when I realized Robert was standing right in front of me.

“Oh.” I frowned. “What?”

“You are a goddess.”

A goddess. I liked the sound of that. “I don’t think anyone has ever called me … that … before.”

“That surprises me.”

Robert’s hands were no longer shaking. But mine were. When it came to men, I was used to being the pursuer. Men responded to it, yes, but the dramatic one-liners—you’re a goddess, et cetera—they usually came from me. It was strange sitting in the other seat. Good strange.

“I like you,” I said, as much to myself as to him. The revelation was as unexpected as it was undeniable.

“I like you, too.” Robert’s voice was awkward, but he may have been suppressing a smile. “Gracie.”

*   *   *

When I heard Robert’s keys in the door, I rose from my chair. I spied him at the end of the corridor, his tie pulled loose, his face concerned. “Grace. Are you okay?”

I stumbled toward him. “No. I’m not okay.”

“What is it?” he asked. “What’s happened?”

I let out a sob. “There’s … there’s been a complaint made against me … with the Board of Nursing … by a doctor.”

Robert stepped away from me. “What?”

“It’s about the baby I delivered last night. She was born with a cleft lip and palate. We delivered her here then transferred both mother and baby to the hospital. The doctor—he went ballistic. Said he would report me.”

“What has he reported you for?”

“He says delivering a baby with a cleft palate was too high-risk to attempt at home, and also that I shouldn’t have transferred a patient with a perineal tear.”

“Did you know the baby had a cleft palate?” Robert’s expression was curiously blank. His voice was low and steady, his tone unreadable.

“Once labor had started … yes.”

“And the tear?” he asked.

“I knew about the tear, but I thought it was best for the patient and baby to—”

“Fuck, Grace!”

Robert’s outburst was so unexpected, I jumped.

“This is great, this is just … fantastic.”

“Robert, what’s wrong?”

He began to pace. “Do you have any idea how much shit I am in if I lose my job? Do you? We won’t even be able to make the next mortgage payment. That’s what we signed up for when we moved here. Every day I go into work, wondering if today’s the day I’m going to bring home my stuff in a cardboard box. I’m worrying about you and our future. Meanwhile, you’re taking unnecessary risks and putting our family at risk! For what?”

Robert stopped pacing and pressed his fingertips into his eye sockets. His cheeks were red. “We need your income, Grace. It may not be huge, but we rely on it. We can’t afford for you to take risks. Not right now.” He let out a long sigh and looked at me. The heat in his face was gone. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have shouted.”

“It’s all right,” I said automatically.

“It’s not. It’s just … a rough time right now. And I need you to be at work. I don’t have room in my head to deal with anything else.”

“Okay.”

I stood before him, shell-shocked. In our entire marriage, Robert had shouted only a handful of times. Once after I fell asleep at the wheel, driving home from a birth, and wrapped the car around a tree. (His anger was out of concern for me, rather than about the car.) Another time when Neva was nine and she ran onto the road after her Frisbee. Once when I taped The Golden Girls over the video of him skydiving in Australia. He was always apologetic afterwards, but this time I got the feeling that his anger remained. And I hadn’t even told him the full story. I lowered my gaze and whispered: “I can’t deliver any babies until after the investigation, Robert.”

Robert’s eyes bugged. “What?”

“My license is suspended. I can’t do any more deliveries. So I won’t be getting an income.”

Robert stared at me. The disbelief in his expression was much worse than the shouting. When my phone started ringing, Robert turned on his heel.