The silence at the table was thick enough to cut with a knife.
Annabel pushed a piece of pancake around her plate, the syrup a sticky, amber puddle that she refused to touch.
The bacon, once a beacon of comfort, lay like a slab of rubber.
Fred ate with deliberate slowness, his fork scraping against the plate as he pretended not to notice her cold, coiled fury.
He tried to speak to her a few times, his voice a low rumble, but she pretended not to hear.
"Annabel?" he asked.
She took a long, exaggerated sip of coffee, the mug rattling slightly as she set it back down.
"The coffee's good," he said.
She stared at a spot on the wall behind him, her jaw clenched tight.
He fell silent again, and the only sounds were the distant hum of the refrigerator and the quiet clink of his uten
