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lifted it to her ear.
    â€œYes?” she said.
    â€œCan she eat peanut butter? I forget, a lot of kids can’t eat peanut butter,” the babysitter asked.
    â€œYes, she can eat peanut butter,” Anna said.
    â€œOkay, thanks! See you soon,” said the babysitter, and she hung up.
    Anna felt the weight of the cell phone in her hand; she slid into the car, set it on the seat beside her, and began to drive home.
    T HAT NIGHT, SHE CALLED THE CREDIT CARD COMPANY TO CANCEL the card. “You didn’t purchase the steaks, the tickets, the watches?” asked the customer service rep.
    â€œNo, I did not!”
    â€œAha. Well. Unfortunately, I see that you never purchased the customer fraud insurance plan, just $8 a month, so we can’t guarantee all will be returned—”
    â€œAre you serious?” she asked.
    â€œYou could purchase it now,” the customer service rep said, cheerfully.
    It took her three more days to show the bill to her husband and inform him about the absence of the fraud insurance plan. They sat at the kitchen table, and she put the bill in front of him. He read it, and then he stopped.
    â€œFive hundred dollars of steaks?” he said. “Did he eat a whole cow?” He paused. “And watches? Who are we subsidizing here?”
    She realized that she was drawn to his moral quality because she was always waiting to be judged.
    â€œIt was an accident,” she said.
    They looked at each other. He leaned forward and touched her arm.
    â€œWhat’s going on?” he asked.
    She closed her eyes. What? She remembered the musty odor of the hotel carpet, the sudden, surprising beauty of Warren Vance. She thought about how she had hunched under the chair, listening to the bullets, the cries as people were hit, the sound of people diving for the floor, running out. She thought of the way he nodded toward the door, and how she ran through the hallway, following him, her footsteps echoing through the empty corridor until she got to the parking lot of the Mercury Hotel, and stood at the edge of it, looking at the freeway, the cars a pure ribbon of light.
    â€œI was almost shot,” she said.
    She heard each word as she spoke them. She did not look into his eyes. She felt the sweet presence of his fingers on her wrist.
    â€œWhat did you think about?” he asked. “During?”
    She had had no thoughts. The chair leg, the carpet. The taste of salt in her mouth. She remembered a sense of urgency in her arms, a trembling. To move.
    Then she ran.
    â€œI’m not sure,” she said.
    â€œDid you think about the children?” he asked.
    She paused. “No.”
    â€œYour parents?”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œDid you think about me?”
    She paused. “No.”
    He leaned back. “Why not?”
    â€œI thought about myself,” she said.
    That was true. There had been the thunder of bullets, the carpet against her cheek. The slow pulse of her breath. And when she had run outside, there had been this gladness, her chest full of cool air. She was here. The asphalt was warm, crumbly under her bare feet. The light from the cars lifted off the freeway. She surveyed it all, wanting it, wanting to reach out and feel the light in her hands.
    They sat in silence for a moment.
    â€œI would have thought of myself, too,” he said. “I know it.”
    How perfectly could they recognize each other’s sadness? It was the imperfection that they had married and pledged to care for. She leaned toward him and kissed him. His hand grabbed her shoulders as though they were both floating, moving without gravity through the air.
    T HE LIGHTS WENT ON IN ANNA’S HOUSE EACH NIGHT, AS THEY WENT on in the other houses on their street. The houses clung to the arid hills, temporarily finding a foothold in the brush. One night, Anna told her husband they had to tell their daughter good night and then leave the room while she fell asleep. He