Claire’s ring had rolled to the edge of the sink, and Mathieu caught it between two fingers before it disappeared beneath the dish rack.
“There,” he said. “Ten years of marriage saved by a reflex.”
Claire, her hands covered in soil, looked up at him wearily.
“The drain is plugged.”
“You destroy all domestic poetry.”
“It’s a calling.”
She had taken off her wedding ring to repot the lemon tree dying on the windowsill. For three weeks, the new pot had waited in a paper bag behind the kitchen door. Twice Mathieu had offered to do it. Twice Claire had said she would. That Monday morning, she had spread potting soil across the table, opened the window despite the March cold, and begun the operation with the slightly aggressive concentration she reserved for things she had put off too long.
Mathieu placed the ring on the sink’s black tile, removed his own, and set it beside hers. Two almost identical bands, if you did not look closely. His was wider, the outside edge worn on the palm side. Claire’s had a fine scratch that caught the light.
He knew where it came from. A bicycle lock, place Graslin, a month after their wedding. Claire had sworn for ten minutes because she had just collected the bicycle from the repair shop and scratched her ring before she even managed to get on it.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“Checking I’ve got the right wife.”
She gave a brief, involuntary laugh.
“You have a fifty-fifty chance.”
He picked up his phone to photograph the rings, framed between a chipped cup and a streak of soil. Claire immediately reached out.
“No.”
“No what?”
“No ‘ten years, two rings, one lemon tree’ photo. I forbid you to become a man with an Instagram anniversary caption.”
“I’m not even on Instagram.”
“That’s what makes you dangerous. You could start.”
End of excerpt. Discover the other stories in this universe.