Tuesday started the way most Tuesdays started, except that he noticed it starting, which was itself new. The alarm at six-fifteen, Sophia already half awake beside him, the cool flat light through the blinds that hadn’t yet decided whether the day would be clear. He lay there for a moment longer than usual before getting up, not thinking about anything specific, just registering the particular quality of a morning when a decision was somewhere in the room with him, unspoken but present, the way a guest who has arrived early sits in the kitchen while the host finishes dressing.He skipped the long walk. He told himself it was because he wanted to get ahead of the Alcott draft before Amrita arrived, and that was true, but it wasn’t the whole truth, and he knew it wasn’t, because the long walk was the place he did the thinking he wasn’t ready to do yet, and this morning he wanted the thinking postponed a little longer.He was at his desk by seven-forty. Amrita’s office light was already

The board call was scheduled for nine, and James was in the building by seven-thirty, not because anything required it of him this early but because some part of him wanted to be present for the whole shape of the day rather than arriving in the middle of it.Amrita was already at her desk when he passed, the now-familiar light under her door, and she fell into step with him without being asked when he stopped to say good morning.“You slept,” she said, looking at him. “I can tell. You look less like a man who closed a file at midnight.”“I closed the client file at six. I stayed open on the other one a while longer.”“How long is a while.”“Longer than I meant to. I’ll tell you about it sometime when it’s further along.”“I’ll hold you to that.” She fell into pace beside him toward his office, notebook already in hand. “Board call’s at nine. Dana wants us on a separate line, listening only, in case anything in the statement language needs real-time clarification, but she doesn’t want

James was at his desk by seven-thirty Tuesday morning, the Hartwell file open in front of him, the particular gray light of an overcast morning coming through the study window in a way that made the room feel smaller than it had felt the day before, more like an office, less like whatever it had briefly become on Monday. He had slept well, better than he’d expected, and had woken with the eleven sentences still somewhere in the back of his mind, not insistent, just present, the way a piece of music stays present after the room goes quiet.His phone rang at eight, earlier than he expected anyone to call. Amrita.“Tell me you’re not calling about Drummond already,” he said, picking up. “The call’s not until tomorrow.”“I’m not calling about Drummond. I’m calling about something that happened five minutes ago, and I genuinely don’t know whether it’s a problem or not, and you’re the only person I trust to tell me honestly instead of just reassuring me.”“Go ahead.”“Patricia Yuen called m

Thursday started with rain, the first real rain in over a week, and James woke to the sound of it against the bedroom window before his alarm had a chance to. Sophia was still asleep beside him, an unusual luxury for her, and he lay still for a few minutes rather than getting up immediately, watching the gray light shift slightly behind the curtains.By the time he came downstairs she was already at the kitchen table, scrubs half on, hair still damp, scrolling through something on her phone with the particular focus that meant work rather than leisure.“You’re up early,” he said, starting the coffee.“Seven a.m. case got moved to six-thirty. Apparently the patient’s family wants to be back on the road by noon, some flight they can’t miss.” She didn’t look up from the phone. “I have to leave in fifteen minutes. Tell me something good before I go, I need it before this particular morning.”“Pemberton account today. Less interesting than yesterday, probably.”“That’s not something good,

Saturday had no schedule in it, the first morning all week without a call waiting somewhere in the hours ahead, and James woke late, past eight, to find Sophia already gone from the bed, the house carrying the particular quiet of a weekend morning rather than a workday one.He found her in the kitchen, still in pajamas, a rarity for her even on weekends, reading something on her tablet with a mug of tea cooling beside her.“No clinic today,” she said, not looking up. “No surgery, no department anything. I checked twice last night because I genuinely didn’t trust it.”“What are you reading?”“A journal article I’ve been putting off for two weeks. Nothing urgent, just overdue.” She set the tablet down, looked at him properly. “I was thinking we could do nothing today. Genuinely nothing. No errands, no obligations, not even the good kind like the walk yesterday. Just a day where neither of us has anywhere to be and nothing we’re supposed to produce.”James felt something in him want to i