The night my wife mentioned her high school reunion, I didn’t even bother to look up from my phone.
I was buried in emails, wrapped in the quiet importance I assigned to my own career, while she stood in the kitchen doorway holding a cream-colored invitation. The light caught the edge of it, and for a brief second, I saw something soft in her expression—hope, maybe. The kind of look someone wears when they’re offering you something meaningful and waiting to see if you’ll treat it gently.