The conversation had gone somewhere hard. Neither of them had words for a minute. He didn't try to fix it or make a joke or summarize. He just sat there in the quiet with her, his hand still on her knee where it had been. The impulse to fill the space came up — he could feel it lift his jaw, try to pull a phrase out — and he let it rise and pass without acting on it. The quiet stretched. She took a breath. Eventually she started again, haltingly, with the next thing she needed to say. He was still there. He had been the whole time.
