Abandoned on a Snow Mountain, I Became a Tycoon's Obsession

Final.Scene

Transcript

00:05:25You think you've won?

00:05:28You have money?

00:05:30You have a name?

00:05:31You have him?

00:05:32She tipped her chin at the corner.

00:05:34You spent seven years on Preston Marsh.

00:05:37Seven years.

00:06:08He never looked at you,

00:06:08my money.

00:06:38not at your price not at any price get out she did not move a footstep behind her from the

00:06:45corridor garcia in the doorway two security guards a respectful distance behind sloan

00:06:49you think you've cleaned all of it up she picked up the lilies on her way out wait until the

00:06:53audit

00:06:53drops then ask damien crane what he found the door closed behind her i turned my head toward

00:06:59the corner chair damien was already standing he did not look at me he was looking at the door

00:07:03reagan had just walked through his jaw was set in a way i had not seen since the tent in

00:07:07wrangle

00:07:08he turned to me the look i caught the first time was a man assessing exactly how angry he should

00:07:12let himself become damien sat back down on the edge of the bed he took his time he did not

00:07:16rush he laced

00:07:17his fingers across his knee he breathed in once deeply the way i had seen him do at family dinners

00:07:21when his mother said something cruel and he chose not to make it a war sloan she has mastered clues

00:07:25that we do not know that's right it's related to auditing about the audit i waited he was choosing

00:07:32his word i was going to wait until tomorrow to bring this up the audit is not finished the number

00:07:37is not final how bad six million unaccounted for is the floor not the ceiling six million dollars was

00:07:44not a clerical error six million dollars was a pattern six million through what a shell company

00:07:52registered in delaware address goes to a peepo box the signatory is a name i'm running down

00:07:57the wire pattern matches equipment vendor payments diving rigs that never arrived drill bits that were

00:08:03never installed travel reimbursements for trips no one took for seven years for at least the last

00:08:10four i closed my eyes the money had never mattered my family had given the foundation more in any

00:08:16single year than what preston had pocket in four what mattered was the shape of it the shape was he

00:08:21had been planning this since at least four years ago since the year he and i had taken a sabbatical

00:08:26month to iceland together the year he had asked me to marry him and then walked it back the same

00:08:31evening because it wasn't the right time

00:08:37damien

00:08:39i opened my eyes what does reagan have that we don't

00:08:45her name on a wire two of them so far

00:08:53she's not the graduate studies she's been pretending to be damien laid it out on the rolling

00:08:57tray table at my elbow two wire transferals both routed through the same delaware shell both signed

00:09:01at the receiving end by our snow the amounts were not enormous 84 000 112 000 both wired in the

00:09:07last

00:09:0714 months both dated to weeks reagan had been listed on preston's expedition minused as a junior

00:09:11researcher 84 000 for what equipment line item a piece of sonar gear that was never delivered

00:09:17she's 26 she's 26 on paper her undergrad was an internship at a foundation in connecticut

00:09:24whose director sat on three of preston's grant review panels

00:09:28she wasn't his accident she was his hire

00:09:31she was his hire

00:09:36how long have you known

00:09:39since the second wire cleared

00:09:42four months

00:09:46i was building i needed the chain to be unbreakable

00:09:50if you'd come to me sooner i'd have moved sooner

00:09:56i didn't know to come to you

00:09:58i know

00:09:59a nurse pushed open the door look at my face looked at the tray of documents looked at damon and

00:10:03quietly

00:10:03backed out damon picked up a fresh sheet from the bottom of the stack he turned it so i could

00:10:07see it was a screen grab of a private social media account locked one of two followers the

00:10:10western handle of a core counts the hand was not mine the post was dated two years before reagan

00:10:15had supposedly emailed preston out of the bluers the pin post was a photograph of preston

00:10:18in cross and shoe seat or hand invencible the wound throbbed once i let it

00:10:23damien

00:10:26she's been with him for

00:10:27at minimum three years

00:10:32three years

00:10:33three years was an entire fellowship cycle

00:10:35three years was a lab move

00:10:37three years was every conference where preston had told me he was too overwhelmed to bring me as a guest

00:10:42three years was the time during which i had been planning a wedding in my head

00:10:45while writing his grants in my hand

00:10:47i picked the photograph back up

00:10:49the hand on preston's cheek had a small mark at the wrist

00:10:52the same shape as a beauty mark reagan had

00:10:54very pale almost invisible against her skin i had once told her that mark was lovely

00:11:00she had told me she hated it

00:11:05how long until the audit drops

00:11:08friday three days

00:11:10how long until the criminal complaint files

00:11:14riley pope has already been brought in for questioning by the u.s attorney's office

00:11:17preston

00:11:18he'll be charged tuesday federal jurisdiction the beacon falls under interstate field safety regulations

00:11:23reagan reagan is more delicate the wires are evidence of fraud the relationship is evidence of motive

00:11:27the recording is evidence of intent but she'll lawyer up fast i expect her to flip on preston by the

00:11:32end of next week

00:11:32and the academic side

00:11:34marsh's ethics committee convenes wednesday at his university

00:11:37we are providing the audit the recording and the wires outcome is predictable

00:11:41he'll be stripped of his appointment his doctoral supervision rights his five most recent publications and the federal grant he

00:11:46was about to sign

00:11:48reeves

00:11:49damie did not blink

00:11:50reeves has known about the embezzlement for at least two years

00:11:53i closed my eyes

00:11:55he nominated you for the independent fellowship in part to diffuse internal questions about who your name kept appearing on

00:12:00the foundation paperwork and never on the bylines

00:12:02that's why he called me

00:12:04that's why

00:12:04a door opened

00:12:05i opened my eyes

00:12:06my father was standing in the doorway

00:12:08eyes red

00:12:09coats till on

00:12:10the wrinkles on his face deeper than i remembered

00:12:11you

00:12:12damien stood up

00:12:13he stopped two feet from damien and put both hands on damien's shoulders

00:12:15he did not look at me as he passed thank you

00:12:17my father had not cried in front of me since my mother's funeral

00:12:21he did not cry now

00:12:22exactly

00:12:22but he sat on the edge of my bed

00:12:24and held my left hand the one with damien's signet still on the forefinger

00:12:27and he did not let go for a long time

00:12:29don't talk

00:12:30he held my hand

00:12:31i have to

00:12:32sloan

00:12:32don't talk

00:12:33he looked at the signet

00:12:34he looked at damien standing very still by the window

00:12:37how long

00:12:3920 years sir

00:12:41i know that

00:12:42i mean the ring

00:12:44five days

00:12:45dad nodded once

00:12:46slow

00:12:53the pierces boy

00:12:55the one who used to follow sloan around the orchard at thanksgiving

00:12:58and pretend he didn't care if she shared her dessert

00:13:02yes sir

00:13:03dad almost smiled

00:13:04i told your father at the time

00:13:06told him what sir

00:13:08that you were going to be the kind of man

00:13:10who ran out of things to fear by the age of 30

00:13:17he didn't believe me

00:13:19he was wrong

00:13:22sweetheart

00:13:25the foundation is mine again

00:13:28as of this morning

00:13:29the board approved a clean break from the marsh laboratory and all of his ongoing projects

00:13:36the audit will be public when it drops

00:13:39your name will be cleared as of friday morning

00:13:42the donor wall in cambridge will be re-engraved with your sole credit on the whitfield climate initiative

00:13:49dad that's

00:13:50that's seven years of your life sloan

00:13:52not a favor

00:13:53he pressed my hand

00:13:55he stood up

00:13:56he kissed my forehead the way he had when i was a child home from school with strep

00:14:03i'm gonna step outside and let you rest

00:14:05i'll be in the hall

00:14:06i'll be in the hall

00:14:07he looked at damien

00:14:08crane

00:14:09sir

00:14:10when she's better

00:14:12we talk

00:14:15yes sir

00:14:18the door closed

00:14:22i looked at damien

00:14:23i had known him for a long time

00:14:26he gave you permission

00:14:27he sat back down on the edge of the bed

00:14:30he didn't have to

00:14:31i never asked him for any

00:14:36but yes

00:14:37he did

00:14:40i'll wait until you're ready

00:14:43for what

00:14:44he almost smiled

00:14:46not quite

00:14:47everything

00:15:00friday morning

00:15:01the audit dropped

00:15:01it hit the internet at 6 a.m. eastern

00:15:04a leak coordinated

00:15:05presumably

00:15:05by damien's communications team went to a science investigative reporter at a respected outlet

00:15:10by 8

00:15:11the headline had been picked up by every major u.s. paper

00:15:14by 10

00:15:15the hashtag was trending

00:15:16garcia walked into my room with a tablet and a tray of fresh squeezed orange juice

00:15:20216 articles since 6

00:15:23she tapped the screen

00:15:26glaciatology star falls in whitefield foundation fraud probe inside the regulin cover

00:15:31up

00:15:31i scrolled photographs of preston photographs of the rangel camp a still from the radio archive

00:15:36showing the time stamp on preston's order to disable my beacon a photograph of the equipment

00:15:41crate i had spent the night inside with claw marks down the side taken by a federal

00:15:46investigator the morning after my evacuation the comments were brutal if this is what academic

00:15:51excellence looks like this man let his girlfriend bleed in the snow for a grant

00:15:55the deputy who turned off her beacon should be in handcuffs by lunch

00:15:59i scrolled until i found reagan

00:16:01she had preempted the audit

00:16:04sloane whitfield could have died

00:16:06cry harder

00:16:08i closed the tablet

00:16:10how is preston taking it

00:16:11he has not been seen leaving his apartment

00:16:13the university has placed him on administrative leave pending wednesday's hearing

00:16:16riley pope has been charged

00:16:18he pleaded out

00:16:1918 months federal with cooperation

00:16:21reagan snow's lawyer issued a statement at 7 a.m. claiming she will fully co-op

00:16:25reeves

00:16:25dr reeves announced his retirement at 6 30 effective immediately the university accepted within the hour

00:16:31i exhaled

00:16:32the wound did not mind anymore

00:16:34in a meeting

00:16:35he'll be back at noon

00:16:37he left this for you

00:16:37she slid a small white card onto the tray

00:16:40i picked it up

00:16:41by saturday i was sitting upright in a chair by the window

00:16:44by sunday i was walking the corridor twice a day with a nurse at my elbow

00:16:48by monday they had moved me out of the icu and into a regular suite on the 14th floor

00:16:53where the view stretched all the way down across the east river

00:16:56the flowers had started arriving friday afternoon and had not stopped

00:16:59the first arrangement was from my graduate school cohort

00:17:02the second from the foundation board

00:17:04the third and this one had made me sit up from the chair of the national science foundation

00:17:08who had written a personal note saying he had been appalled

00:17:10and that i should consider when i was well enough picking up the principal investigator role on the project

00:17:15that had been preston's

00:17:16the fourth came with no card

00:17:18you're upright

00:17:20i'm upright

00:17:22how does it feel

00:17:23like i have a hole in my chest but a much smaller one than yesterday

00:17:26he almost smiled

00:17:28from you

00:17:32narcissus

00:17:33from the lake house

00:17:38damien

00:17:38he met my eyes

00:17:41how long

00:17:44the flower

00:17:46since you were 12

00:17:48not the flower

00:17:49he sat on the edge of the bed

00:17:50i sat with that

00:17:51sloan

00:17:5220 years

00:17:52i was 29

00:17:5320 years

00:17:54that meant when i had cried to him about my freshman year boyfriend at 16 he had already known

00:17:58that meant every time

00:17:59over the long stretch of years

00:18:00he had appeared at the edge of my life with the precise timing of a person who was paying very

00:18:04close attention

00:18:05without ever announcing himself

00:18:06i looked at the signet on my left hand

00:18:10damien

00:18:16why didn't you ever say

00:18:18damien took a long time to answer

00:18:19the light from the window had begun to thin

00:18:22the kind of new york winter dusk that turns everything blue

00:18:25when you were 12 you were 12 there was nothing to say

00:18:29when you were 16 you were dating that boy

00:18:31you were happy there was nothing to say

00:18:33when you were 19 you came home from college and told me you'd met a graduate student named

00:18:38preston marsh

00:18:40you want to know what i thought of him

00:18:44i told you he was fine

00:18:45you told me he was fine

00:18:48he wasn't fine

00:18:49i knew he wasn't fine

00:18:52but you wanted permission you were not asking me what i thought of him

00:18:58you were asking me to bless what you had already decided

00:19:01you blessed it anyway

00:19:04i blessed it anyway

00:19:05why

00:19:06he looked down at his hands

00:19:08because if i'd said no you have done it anyway and i would have lost you for the next decade

00:19:12instead of being able to sit across a holiday table from you twice a year

00:19:16i made a calculation

00:19:18the calculation was wrong

00:19:20he looked up

00:19:22i would have made a different one

00:19:24if i had known

00:19:26known what

00:19:27that he would put a hole in your chest

00:19:29the room held the sentence

00:19:30i felt the wound stir

00:19:32it did not hurt the same way anymore

00:19:33it hurt differently

00:19:34like something was being said through it

00:19:36and not done to it

00:19:38it wasn't his hole

00:19:39it was an ice shard

00:19:40it was his hole

00:19:41he left you with it

00:19:43he turned off your beacon

00:19:45he drove away

00:19:46he did not soften the statement

00:19:47the shape of the wound is ice full

00:19:49and you crossed the country

00:19:51the cause of the wound is preston marsh

00:19:53i would have crossed any country

00:19:58damien

00:19:58he did not look away

00:20:04i'm not gonna forgive him

00:20:06i know

00:20:07i'm not gonna take him back

00:20:09i know

00:20:11i am however

00:20:13going to need a minute

00:20:19i've spent a lifetime waiting for you

00:20:21take all the time you need

00:20:26he stood

00:20:27he bent forward

00:20:28his lips brushed my forehead

00:20:29light

00:20:29the way an older brother might

00:20:30the way a person who had been disciplined about a feeling for a very long time might

00:20:34when the door was finally cracked open

00:20:35i have a meeting at 7

00:20:37i'll be back at 9

00:20:38damien

00:20:41don't be late

00:20:42he almost smiled

00:20:44he left

00:20:45the narcissist on the windowsill held their pale yellow in the blue light

00:20:50tuesday afternoon

00:20:51preston was arraigned

00:20:52i did not watch the live stream

00:20:53gossier told me about it after the fact

00:20:56sitting in the chair by my bed with her tablet face down on her knee

00:20:59she summarized in her efficient

00:21:01neutral voice the same voice she used to read me the morning's flower deliveries

00:21:05preston had been processed through the federal courthouse in lower manhattan

00:21:09the charges were read loud

00:21:10federal embezzlement and wire fraud

00:21:13knowingly dissaying a fellow team member's emergency equipment in a hazardous environment

00:21:18and falsification of federal grant documentation

00:21:31his bail had been set at one million dollars

00:21:34his attorney had argued he was not a flight risk

00:21:37the prosecution had pointed to the whitfield foundation audit

00:21:40and to a passport that

00:21:42on inspection

00:21:43contained a sealed visa for a country with no extradition treaty

00:21:46his bail was set at one million dollars

00:21:49his attorney argued he was not a flight risk

00:21:51the prosecution pointed to the audit

00:21:54and to a passport with a visa for a country with no extradition treaty

00:21:58bail remained at one million dollars

00:22:00his passport was revoked

00:22:02how did he look

00:22:04smaller

00:22:05smaller

00:22:06at faculty fundraisers he carried himself like a man waiting to be the smartest in any room

00:22:11today he carried himself like a man waiting to be told what to do

00:22:15she set the tablet on the bedside table

00:22:17mr crane wants me to tell you

00:22:18wednesday's ethics committee hearing has been moved to 10 a.m

00:22:22the university requested that you attend by video link

00:22:24you may decline

00:22:26i'll attend

00:22:28mr crane suspected you would

00:22:32she rose

00:22:32is there anything else miss whitfield

00:22:34one thing

00:22:37reagan

00:22:38she has not been arraigned

00:22:40the u.s attorney's office is finalizing terms

00:22:42she will testify against preston and dr reeves

00:22:45she will not be testifying against you

00:22:47she will likely receive limited immunity on the fraud charges

00:22:50a deferred prosecution agreement

00:22:52community service and a permanent bar from federally funded research

00:22:55she still has her social media

00:22:57she still has her social media the court cannot regulate that

00:23:01that's fine

00:23:03let her have it

00:23:04mr crane will be displeased

00:23:06mr crane will live

00:23:08garcia paused

00:23:09halfway to the door

00:23:11garcia tilted her head a fraction

00:23:12she almost laughed

00:23:13she left

00:23:14i lay back against the pillows and watched the narcissist tilt slowly toward the late afternoon sun

00:23:19wednesday morning

00:23:2010 a.m garcia rolled in a portable monitor on a tray and angled it toward the bed

00:23:24the ethics committee at preston's university convened on screen seven chairs around a heavy wood table in a panelled room

00:23:30i had been inside

00:23:30once during my own thesis defense when reeves had introduced me as one of his students

00:23:35reeves was not at the table today

00:23:37he had retired friday morning

00:23:38the chair of the committee

00:23:39a tall woman in her 60s whose hair was twisted into a low knot

00:23:43opened the proceedings

00:23:45mr marsh do you have anything to say before we begin

00:23:48preston rose from his seat at the foot of the table

00:23:50he had aged a decade and five days

00:23:52the polished hair was unkempt

00:23:54the pressed shirt was open at the collar without a tie

00:23:57i do

00:23:57his voice was flatter than i had ever heard it

00:24:00whatever the committee decides i accept

00:24:03i acknowledge the irregularities in the funding records of the regling expedition

00:24:09i acknowledge the irregularities in the authorship history of the manuscripts under review

00:24:15on the day of the avalanche i did not handle the evacuation of my team as i should have

00:24:20the chair did not soften

00:24:21i accept the consequences of those choices

00:24:24the committee has reviewed the audit the field radio archive the wire records and the personal contribution log of sloan

00:24:31whitstone

00:24:31the committee has also reviewed the statement obtained this morning under cooperation agreement from riley pope

00:24:39do you acknowledge that you transmitted a radio instruction to disable sloan whitfile's emergency locator

00:24:47the room is very still

00:24:51i do

00:24:55at the time you transmitted that instruction were you aware that sloan whitston was injured

00:25:00and at the edge of the camp perimeter

00:25:06i do

00:25:09mr marsh

00:25:10the committee finds the following

00:25:12you have engaged in academic misconduct of the most serious kind

00:25:18your conduct on the day of the avalanche

00:25:21endangered the life of a fellow expedition member

00:25:24the body of work submitted under your sole authorship for the past four years

00:25:29contains substantial material taken from the unpublished work of sloan whitnick

00:25:33without consent or attribution

00:25:39the committee recommends that your tenure be revoked

00:25:42your doctoral supervision rights be terminated and the five most recent publications under your name be retracted

00:25:47you be permanently barred from holding any federally funded academic appointment

00:25:51the regolith climate proxies grant should be revoked and the funds returned

00:25:54do you wish to respond

00:25:56do you wish to respond

00:26:26it's done

00:26:29it's done

00:26:37it's done

00:26:38he came on thursday not by appointment

00:26:40There's a man at security in the lobby asking to see you

00:26:43He's same

00:26:44He said his name was Preston Marsh

00:26:46I had told Garcia

00:26:48He said he doesn't expect you to say yes

00:26:51Let him up

00:26:51That I would receive him

00:26:53I had thought about it carefully

00:26:54I had thought about it the way Damien thought about a chain of evidence

00:26:57Not for spite

00:26:58Not for forgiveness

00:26:59But to close the circuit

00:27:00I had spent seven years inside that circuit

00:27:02I needed to walk out under my own power

00:27:04Damien was in a meeting on the other side of town

00:27:07I had not told him I had agreed to this

00:27:09I had not told him I had not agreed to this either

00:27:11The door opened

00:27:12Preston stood in the doorway

00:27:13He did not come in

00:27:14He looked exactly as he had on the video feed except smaller

00:27:17Somehow

00:27:18In person

00:27:19The way Garcia had said

00:27:20The charcoal suit replaced by jeans and a sweater that did not fit him quite right

00:27:23The glass is askew

00:27:33Sloan

00:27:34Get up

00:27:35I won't

00:27:36I'm not asking

00:27:37He stayed where he was

00:27:38I came to apologize

00:27:42He breathed in once

00:27:44At once

00:27:46I owe you an apology I cannot make in two pages

00:27:49I wrote it badly

00:27:52Every grant

00:27:54Every piece of equipment

00:27:56Every late night

00:27:59I knew

00:28:00I always knew

00:28:01I told myself a story about it that let me sleep

00:28:05And the night of the avalanche

00:28:07I told Riley to turn off the beacon

00:28:12I told myself the Whitfields would send a plane

00:28:15I told myself

00:28:18You would always have a way out

00:28:21That's what I told myself

00:28:23So leaving you in the snow had no consequence

00:28:33That's what I told myself

00:28:35The room held it

00:28:36I let it hold

00:28:49Preston

00:28:49He looked up

00:28:51Get off the floor

00:28:55I won't

00:28:56You will

00:28:57Because this is my room

00:28:59In my hospital

00:29:00In my city

00:29:01And I'm telling you to

00:29:02He got off the floor

00:29:03He stood near the foot of my bed

00:29:05Three things

00:29:06Hands at his sides

00:29:07Head still bowed

00:29:08One

00:29:09I am not retracting any of the charges

00:29:11The federal case will proceed

00:29:14Your career will not survive it

00:29:16That is not negotiable

00:29:19I haven't

00:29:21Two

00:29:22I will not be writing a victim impact statement

00:29:25That asks the court for leniency

00:29:27I will be writing one that asks the court to apply

00:29:30The full weight of the statute

00:29:32You are free to write your own

00:29:33You are free to ask Dr. Rivals to write his own

00:29:37Understood

00:29:38Three

00:29:41I looked at him for a long time

00:29:43He had once been a man I would have crossed any distance to please

00:29:47There had been a year possibly two when I had organized my entire life around the question

00:29:51Of what Preston would think

00:29:53I looked at him now and I felt nothing

00:29:55Not contempt

00:29:56Not pity

00:29:57Not love

00:29:58Not even anger

00:29:59A clean nothing

00:30:00The way you might look at a coat you wore through college

00:30:02Hanging in the back of a closet

00:30:04And feel surprised that you had ever fit into it

00:30:11I do not accept it

00:30:17Not because it isn't sincere

00:30:19Today

00:30:20It might be

00:30:21I think it might be

00:30:23What I have learned

00:30:24In seven years of you

00:30:26Is that your sincerity is a renewable resource

00:30:29It comes back every time the consequences arrive

00:30:32It always sound the same

00:30:35It always asks the same thing

00:30:37Which is for me to absorb the cost

00:30:40I'm done absorbing the cost

00:30:45You will live with what you did

00:30:48I will not be helping you live with it

00:30:51For a moment I thought he might say something more

00:30:53Some version of the speech

00:30:54Refine now to its purest form

00:30:56That he had been delivering to me

00:30:57In fragments

00:30:58For seven years

00:30:59He didn't

00:30:59He closed his eyes once

00:31:01He opened them

00:31:02I understand

00:31:03He walked to the door

00:31:04In the doorway

00:31:04He paused

00:31:05He did not look back

00:31:07Sloan

00:31:09Yes

00:31:10Be happy

00:31:13The door closed behind him

00:31:15I sat alone in the hospital suite

00:31:17With the late afternoon light moving slowly across the floor

00:31:19I waited to feel something

00:31:20After a long time

00:31:21I noticed what I felt was the absence of something

00:31:24A weight I had been carrying since the year I was 22

00:31:28For seven years I carried that weight

00:31:30I turned my life into a project just to be seen

00:31:34I piled up my efforts as evidence

00:31:37But I don't need to be seen by him anymore

00:31:42When I had decided that the rest of my life was going to be a project of making one specific

00:31:47man see me

00:31:47It was no longer there

00:31:48I picked up my phone

00:31:50I texted Damien

00:31:52Come back when you can

00:31:53He answered within 10 seconds

00:31:56On my way

00:31:58Damien did not knock

00:31:59The door to my hospital suite opened 12 minutes after Preston walked out of it

00:32:03And Damien stood in the doorway with snow still melting on his shoulders

00:32:06He did not look at me first

00:32:08He looked at the chair where Preston had been kneeling

00:32:10He looked at the spot on the carpet where Preston's knees had pressed two indentations

00:32:14He looked at the trace of cologne

00:32:15Preston's

00:32:16Faint

00:32:17Civilian still hanging in the air

00:32:19He crossed the room in five strides

00:32:36His thumbs moved across my cheekbones

00:32:39My temples

00:32:40The line of my jaw checking

00:32:42The way a person checks a child after they have fallen

00:32:49I should not have left this morning

00:32:51I asked Garcia to let him up

00:32:56I know

00:32:57She called me on the drive back

00:32:59I broke three traffic laws

00:33:00Damien

00:33:02I would have broken 30

00:33:09Look at me

00:33:19I had not

00:33:20In all the time I had known him

00:33:22Seen Damien Crane afraid of anything

00:33:24Not his father

00:33:26Not his mother

00:33:27Not a boardroom

00:33:28Not a press conference

00:33:30Not the leverage held over him by half of Manhattan

00:33:34He was afraid now

00:33:35He was afraid that I had spent 12 minutes in a room with the man I had loved for 7

00:33:39years

00:33:40And that 12 minutes was all it took for me to forgive him

00:33:45I told him no

00:33:47I know

00:33:49I told him to leave

00:33:53I know

00:33:54I am not going back to him

00:33:57He closed his eyes

00:33:58He pressed his forehead to mine

00:34:00He stayed there

00:34:01Breathing

00:34:02For a long time

00:34:09Sloan

00:34:09I am about to be very selfish

00:34:14Be selfish

00:34:15Be selfish

00:34:17I do not want to leave this room again

00:34:20Then don't

00:34:23He did not

00:34:34He did not sleep that night

00:34:36The chair he pulled up to my bed was leather and too small

00:34:39He folded himself into it anyway

00:34:41He held my left hand inside both of his

00:34:44And watched the heart monitor as if it might lie if he looked away

00:34:47Sometime around 3 a.m.

00:34:50I pretended to be asleep

00:34:51Just to see what he would do

00:34:52He stood up

00:34:54He walked to the window

00:34:55He looked out at the east river for 10 minutes

00:34:58He turned back

00:34:59He stood at the foot of the bed and watched my chest rise and fall

00:35:02Counting

00:35:03With the precision of a man who had once counted my pulse on a medevac

00:35:07Then he came back to the chair

00:35:08He leaned in

00:35:09He pressed his lips

00:35:11Very lightly

00:35:12To the inside of my wrist where the ivy line went in

00:35:14He whispered into my skin

00:35:31I am sorry I did not come sooner

00:35:36When?

00:35:40You were awake

00:35:41Sooner when, Damien?

00:35:48Eight years ago

00:35:50When?

00:35:52The night you came home from grad school for the holiday

00:35:54You laughed at something Preston said about a sample I had never heard of

00:35:58I went home and painted 700 Nassaville on a wall

00:36:02And decided I would wait

00:36:05I should have come for you that night

00:36:09Damien

00:36:11I would have

00:36:11If I had known how it would end

00:36:14He looked at the signet on my fourth finger

00:36:18I bought this a long time ago

00:36:21This ring?

00:36:22This ring

00:36:25For me?

00:36:26For the day I stopped waiting

00:36:30I waited far longer than I should have

00:36:32I am not waiting an hour longer than I have to

00:36:36Damien

00:36:37Hmm

00:36:39What are you telling me?

00:36:40He met my eyes

00:36:46I am telling you that the rest of my life starts at sunrise

00:36:50When you walk out of this hospital

00:36:51You walk into my house

00:36:59And you do not walk out of it again unless I am holding the door

00:37:05The next person who tries to take you from me

00:37:08Will spend the rest of his life regretting it

00:37:25Faster

00:37:26Good

00:37:35Discharge day

00:37:36Damien did not let a nurse touch me

00:37:38He sent the wheelchair away

00:37:40He sent the orderly away

00:37:42He scooped me out of the bed with one arm under my knees and one behind my shoulders and carried

00:37:46me

00:37:47Slowly

00:37:47The length of the corridor to the elevator

00:37:50I had walked

00:37:51By then

00:37:52The length of that corridor on my own three times

00:37:55I did not need to be carried

00:37:56I did not object

00:37:58The elevator opened in the underground garage

00:38:01A black idled

00:38:02He set me down only long enough to open the door

00:38:04And then he lifted me again into the back seat as if the act of placing me there himself was

00:38:09something he could not delegate

00:38:10Garcia

00:38:10In the front passenger's seat

00:38:12Did not turn around

00:38:14The pulled out

00:38:15Damien did not let go of my hand on the drive uptown

00:38:29I bought the building

00:38:31Which building?

00:38:33My building

00:38:33I own the penthouse

00:38:34I bought the rest of it last month

00:38:36All of it?

00:38:37All of it

00:38:39Why?

00:38:41I did not want strangers across a wall from you

00:38:46Damien

00:38:50The other residents have been compensated above market

00:38:53They had 90 days to relocate

00:38:55The last unit cleared on Friday

00:38:57The building is empty except for the staff I vetted

00:39:01And the floor I am going to put your father on if he wants it

00:39:04My father has a house

00:39:06He has a house

00:39:07He may also have the 8th floor

00:39:10Damien

00:39:10You are being excessive

00:39:14I am told I am being excessive

00:39:17He brought my hand to his mouth

00:39:19Tell me to stop

00:39:21I am not telling you to stop

00:39:24I can't bear to

00:39:27The pulled into the garage

00:39:31He carried me into the elevator

00:39:33The doors opened directly into his foyer

00:39:36Into the wall of painted narcissus

00:39:38And he set me down in front of it

00:39:46Look, look

00:39:47I looked

00:39:48A second wall

00:39:49Opposite the first

00:39:51Had been painted in my absence

00:39:53Cores

00:39:54The shapes of ice cores

00:39:5537 of them

00:39:57One for every site I had drilled in 7 years

00:39:59Labeled in white paint in my own handwriting

00:40:01Which had been copied

00:40:03Line for line

00:40:04From photographs of the field journal Reagan had stolen

00:40:07I could not speak

00:40:15I commissioned it in March

00:40:17The artist worked from your notebooks

00:40:19I had the originals returned from the federal evidence locker on a temporary basis

00:40:23They are now back in the locker

00:40:26Damien

00:40:27The paintings are yours

00:40:29Welcome home Sloan

00:40:30The first week in his apartment

00:40:32I learned how he had been loving me for a long time

00:40:35I learned it in small pieces

00:40:36The way a person learns the contents of a house they have moved into without at all

00:40:40A bookshelf in the library held every paper I had ever published even the undergraduate ones

00:40:45Even the conference posters bound in matching cloth and arranged in chronological order

00:40:49A drawer in the kitchen held my mother's recipe for soda bread

00:40:53Hand copied from her handwriting onto a card he had laminated

00:40:56A folder in his study

00:40:57Kept in a drawer he did not lock

00:40:59Contained years of photographs of me

00:41:01Clipped from family Christmas cards and university newsletters

00:41:04And the society pages

00:41:06I found the folder

00:41:07On the sixth day

00:41:08I did not tell him I had found it

00:41:10I sat on the floor of his study and turned through the photographs in order

00:41:13And at the back of the folder I found a single envelope

00:41:16Sealed

00:41:17Addressed to me in his handwriting and dated a long time ago

00:41:20I almost opened it

00:41:21I did not

00:41:22I left it where it was

00:41:23That night at dinner

00:41:24I asked him

00:41:25The letter in the back of the folder

00:41:27He set his fork down

00:41:28He did not pretend to misunderstand

00:41:30You found it

00:41:32What is it?

00:41:34It is what I would have said to you that night if I had come for you instead of painting

00:41:37the wall

00:41:38You kept it?

00:41:41I kept everything

00:41:42Damien

00:41:43I have kept the napkin you wrote your phone number on when you were eleven

00:41:46I have kept the wrapper of the chocolate you split with me at your sister's Christensen

00:41:49I have kept the program of every recital your mother dragged us to

00:41:52I have kept the cockscrew you used to open the wine at your graduation dinner

00:41:55I have kept the boarding pass you gave me when you came back from Iceland the year you turned 23

00:42:00And asked if I would pick you up from JF because your boyfriend had forgotten

00:42:04He met my eyes

00:42:06I have kept all of it because I had to keep something

00:42:08I set my fork down too

00:42:10How many marriages did your mother arrange for you?

00:42:13Three

00:42:15You refused all three

00:42:16I refused all three

00:42:19For me

00:42:20Sloan

00:42:22Everything I have ever refused I refused for you

00:42:24His mother came on Tuesday

00:42:26She had not

00:42:27In the seven years I dated Preston

00:42:29Sent me so much as a holiday card

00:42:31She came now with a bouquet of pale pink peonies

00:42:34And a smile that did not reach her eyes

00:42:36And she sat across from me in Damien's living room

00:42:38With the careful posture of a woman conducting a negotiation she expected to win

00:42:43Damien stood by the window

00:42:44He did not sit

00:42:45He did not greet his mother

00:42:47Sloan and dear

00:42:48I came to welcome you

00:42:49Mrs. Crane

00:42:50I imagine all of this has been very overwhelming

00:42:52The hospital

00:42:52The press

00:42:53My son's enthusiasm

00:42:54His enthusiasm

00:42:55He has always been intense

00:42:58Particularly about the things he has wanted for a long time

00:43:01I wonder if you have considered my dear

00:43:03Whether intensity about this stage in your recovery is perhaps what you need

00:43:06By the window

00:43:07Damien turned

00:43:08He did not raise his voice

00:43:09Mother

00:43:11Damien

00:43:11You have ten seconds to walk out of this apartment

00:43:16Damien I am only

00:43:17Eight seconds

00:43:19You will not speak to me

00:43:21Six seconds

00:43:22The peonies

00:43:24Untouched on the coffee table

00:43:25Trembled with the vibration of the elevator returning to the foyer

00:43:28She rose

00:43:29She gathered her coat

00:43:31She looked at me with the same smile pulled tight across her face

00:43:34My dear

00:43:34When this novelty passes

00:43:36Two seconds

00:43:37She left the elevator doors closed

00:43:39Damien did not move for a long moment

00:43:41Then he crossed the room and knelt in front of the chair where I was sitting

00:43:45He took both my hands

00:43:46Sloan

00:43:48Damien

00:43:49My mother will not be in this apartment again

00:43:51Damien, she's your mother

00:43:52My mother spent a long time telling me I would forget you if I tried hard enough

00:43:55She introduced me to 14 women whose family's my last name

00:43:58She told my father at one point that I was an embarrassment to the family for refusing to marry

00:44:01She does not get to walk in here now and call you a novelty

00:44:04There is no version of this where you are second to anyone, Sloan

00:44:07Not my mother

00:44:09Not the company

00:44:10Not the past

00:44:11He pressed my knuckles to his mouth

00:44:15Not for the rest of my life

00:44:17He visited Preston in prison on a Wednesday

00:44:19I did not know he had gone until he came home and sat across from me at the kitchen island

00:44:24And poured himself a glass of whiskey and told me

00:44:26I went to see Marsh today

00:44:28Damien

00:44:29I had to

00:44:31Why?

00:44:33I wanted him to see my face

00:44:35He turned the glass in his fingers

00:44:37He has been telling himself since the hearing that what happened to him was the system

00:44:41That the audit broke him

00:44:43That the federal prosecutor broke him

00:44:45That the press broke him

00:44:47I wanted him to know it was a man

00:44:49What did you say to him?

00:44:52I sat across a steel table from her 14 minutes

00:44:54I didn't speak for the first 10

00:44:55He waited

00:44:56He was the one who broke

00:44:57He asked me what I wanted

00:44:59I told him I wanted him to understand exactly what he had done

00:45:02That he had touched a woman I had loved for a long time

00:45:04That he had taken 7 years of her life and gambled them on a press release

00:45:09That he had left her in the snow because he assumed her family would clean it up

00:45:12I told him that the part he didn't understand and would now have years to understand

00:45:15Was that there had never been a moment in all the time he had known her when she was unprotected

00:45:19I told him that he was alive only because you had asked me not to make a different decision

00:45:22He drank

00:45:25He cried

00:45:27Damien

00:45:27I did not enjoy it

00:45:28Did you not?

00:45:30He set down the glass

00:45:32I enjoyed every second of it

00:45:33I'm not going to pretend otherwise

00:45:35I sat across from a man who had hurt you and I watched him understand for the first time

00:45:39That he had been a small animal stepping on the tail of a much larger one

00:45:42He came around the island

00:45:44He stopped in front of me

00:45:45He cupped the back of my neck the way he had cupped my skull in the tent

00:45:49That is what I am Sloane

00:45:50With respect to you

00:45:52I

00:45:53Am the much larger animal

00:45:55I will be that animal for the rest of your life

00:45:57For any person who looks at you sideways

00:45:58I am not going to pretend to be a different one

00:46:00Tell me you understand

00:46:03I understand

00:46:04He pressed his forehead to mine

00:46:07Good

00:46:08Reagan called the apartment on a Thursday

00:46:10She had been told

00:46:11By every lawyer involved

00:46:13Not to

00:46:14The no contact clause was in effect

00:46:16She called anyway

00:46:17Through the main line of Crane Industries

00:46:19Asking to be put through to me by name

00:46:21The receptionist forwarded the call to Garcia

00:46:23Garcia forwarded it to Damien

00:46:25Damien answered on speaker

00:46:27In front of me

00:46:28At the kitchen island

00:46:29Miss Snow

00:46:31Master Crane

00:46:32I am calling because

00:46:34You are calling because your book deal collapsed

00:46:37Your father's foundation has been quietly delisted from three donor circles in the last six weeks

00:46:42Your fiancé's family has rescinded the engagement

00:46:45Your apartment lease is not being renewed

00:46:47And you have correctly disduced that all of this is connected

00:46:50Silence

00:46:51It is connected

00:46:52Mr. Crane

00:46:54I would like you to listen to me very carefully

00:46:56Miss Snow

00:46:57The reason your life is currently coming apart

00:46:59Is not because I am vindictive

00:47:01I am perfectly capable of vindictiveness

00:47:04I have not yet been vindictive with you

00:47:06The reason your life is coming apart

00:47:07Is because the woman whose career you tried to take

00:47:09Whose data you stole

00:47:11And whose recording I played in front of you in a tent at minus 31

00:47:14Asked me three months ago to leave you alone

00:47:16I have honored that request

00:47:20I have, how however, not asked any other person who knows you did to honor it

00:47:25It turns out there are a great number of those people

00:47:28They are removing you

00:47:29On their own

00:47:30From the rooms they control

00:47:32The book editor at the publishing house was a former student of Sloan's

00:47:35The donor coordinator at your father's foundation served on a Whitfield panel four years ago

00:47:38Your fiancé's mother has been on the board of the Whitfield Climate Initiative since 2011

00:47:43They are not retaliating the snow

00:47:45They are simply choosing

00:47:46Mr. Crane, please

00:47:48I am not the one you should be asking, Ms. Snow

00:47:50He ended the call

00:47:52He set down the phone

00:47:53He looked at me

00:47:55She will call again

00:47:56She will eventually call you

00:47:58She might

00:47:59I would like permission

00:48:00When she does to make a small adjustment to her circumstances

00:48:03What adjustment?

00:48:04A federal investigation currently dormant into the source of the wire that funded her Arigigrewit internship

00:48:10Damien

00:48:10I will only act if you tell me to

00:48:12I looked at him for a long moment

00:48:14I did not tell him to

00:48:15I also did not tell him not to

00:48:17He read my face

00:48:18He nodded once

00:48:20He poured me a cup of tea

00:48:21The nights were the hardest

00:48:23I had not

00:48:24In seven years with Preston

00:48:26Slept poorly

00:48:27I had slept on his couches and in his tents and across his shoulders on long flights

00:48:31And I had slept the way a person who believed in the structure of her life slept

00:48:35The structure was gone now

00:48:37The nights showed it

00:48:38I did not tell Damien

00:48:39He noticed anyway

00:48:41He noticed on the fourth night

00:48:42When he came up to bring me a book I had asked for

00:48:45And found me sitting on the couch by the south windows with the lights off

00:48:49He set the book down

00:48:50He sat next to me

00:48:51He did not ask

00:48:53He simply pulled me

00:48:54Carefully

00:48:55Against his shoulder

00:48:56And we sat that way until the city lights began to thin toward dawn

00:48:59On the fifth night

00:49:01He came up at ten

00:49:02On the sixth night

00:49:03He came up at nine

00:49:04On the seventh night

00:49:05He stayed

00:49:06He did not ask permission

00:49:08He came up with a small leather bag and a book and the smallest

00:49:11Most contained smile I had ever seen on his face

00:49:14And he said

00:49:15Sloan

00:49:16I am gonna sleep in the second bedroom

00:49:17The door will be open

00:49:19If you need me

00:49:20You say my name

00:49:21You do not have to get up

00:49:22You do not have to ring a bell

00:49:23You say my name

00:49:24And I will be in the room in under three seconds

00:49:27Damien

00:49:28I am not asking for anything

00:49:33I know

00:49:34I am telling you that for the rest of your life

00:49:36If you say my name in the dark

00:49:37I will be there in under three seconds

00:49:40He kissed my forehead

00:49:42He went into the second bedroom

00:49:44He left the door open

00:49:45I lay in my own bed for the first hour

00:49:47I listened to the sounds of him in the next room

00:49:49The small zipper of the leather bag

00:49:51The click of a lamp

00:49:52The soft rustle of a turned page

00:49:54At 11.30

00:49:55The page turning stopped

00:49:56He had fallen asleep with the book on his chest

00:49:59I got up

00:50:00I crossed the hallway

00:50:01I stood in the doorway of the second bedroom

00:50:03And watched him sleep a man in a charcoal pullover

00:50:06And reading glasses

00:50:07In a guest bed in his own house

00:50:09Lit by a single lamp

00:50:10He had been waiting a long time to sleep in the same hallway as me

00:50:13I went back to my room

00:50:15I left both doors open

00:50:16I slept the whole night through

00:50:18He gave me the cranes on a Sunday

00:50:20I had told him

00:50:21Two weeks earlier

00:50:22In the way a person tells a story that no longer matters

00:50:25That as a child I had folded a wish into a paper crane

00:50:28And put it in a jar on my bedroom windowsill

00:50:30The wish had been for my mother to get well

00:50:32My mother had not gotten well

00:50:34I had stopped folding cranes

00:50:36He had said nothing at the time

00:50:37He had simply nodded

00:50:39He led me to the library that Sunday morning

00:50:41He opened the double doors

00:50:42The room three stories of bookshelves

00:50:45A leather sofa

00:50:46His piano against the back wall had been filled

00:50:48Since I had last been in it the day before

00:50:50With paper cranes

00:50:52There were thousands of them

00:50:53They hung from the ceiling on threads of clear nylon

00:50:55In soft drifts

00:50:57At different heights

00:50:58In the pale yellow of winter narcissus

00:51:00I stopped in the doorway

00:51:01One thousand

00:51:04Damien

00:51:04One for every wish I have made for you since we were children

00:51:07I kept count

00:51:08He stepped into the room

00:51:10He turned one of the cranes

00:51:11Gently on its thread

00:51:13I started after the year your mother died

00:51:14I did not know what to do with the things I wanted for you

00:51:16I started folding

00:51:17I folded one a week for the first year

00:51:19Two a week for the next

00:51:20Sometime around my underground years I lost track

00:51:22I counted them last month

00:51:24There were 947

00:51:26I folded the last 53 in the apartment downstairs

00:51:29While you were upstairs sleeping

00:51:30I crossed the room

00:51:31I touched one of the cranes

00:51:33The paper was thin and cool

00:51:35The crease was perfect

00:51:36I knew the fold

00:51:37It was the same fold I had used at 9

00:51:40He had been folding cranes for me

00:51:41Alone in his apartment

00:51:43For a long time

00:51:46Damien

00:51:46Hmm

00:51:47What were the wishes?

00:51:48He looked at me

00:51:49That you would grow up happy

00:51:50That you would grow up loved

00:51:51That you would grow up to do the work you wanted

00:51:54That you would eventually be able to come home and rest

00:51:58That you would eventually see me

00:52:01That is the only wish I never finished folding

00:52:03He reached up and unhooked a single crane from a thread above his head

00:52:07He held it out to me

00:52:08I would like you to fold the last one

00:52:10I took the crane

00:52:10It was a half fold

00:52:12The paper waiting

00:52:12The crease set

00:52:13Damien

00:52:15When you are ready

00:52:18I am ready

00:52:19I folded the last crane

00:52:20The wish I folded inside it was that I had not taken so long to see him

00:52:24I hung it on the empty thread

00:52:26He held me

00:52:27In the doorway of the library

00:52:28For a long time

00:52:32I kissed him that night

00:52:33Not the careful kiss on the couch he had given me weeks ago

00:52:36Not a kiss I was allowing him to give me

00:52:39A kiss I gave him

00:52:40I crossed the library after dinner

00:52:42He was at the piano

00:52:43Playing the eight notes my mother used to hum

00:52:45He did not see me coming

00:52:47I sat down next to him on the bench

00:52:49I waited for him to finish the phrase

00:52:51I tilted his face toward mine with two fingers under his chin

00:52:54I kissed him

00:52:55He went very still

00:52:56For a heartbeat

00:52:57He did not respond

00:52:58Then he made a small sound not a word

00:53:01Something quieter

00:53:02A sound I had never heard him make

00:53:04In all the time I had known him

00:53:05And his hand came up to cut the back of my neck

00:53:07And the bench creaked

00:53:08Because he had moved without thinking

00:53:10He kissed me back the way a man kisses a person

00:53:12He has been kissing in his head every night for a long time

00:53:15When he pulled back

00:53:16Both his hands were on my face

00:53:18His breath was not steady

00:53:19His eyes had gone very dark

00:53:21Sloan

00:53:23Damien

00:53:23I would like to say something

00:53:26Say it

00:53:54Damien

00:53:55Hmm

00:53:58I love you

00:53:59His hands tightened on my face

00:54:01Say it again

00:54:03I love you

00:54:04Again

00:54:06I love you Damien

00:54:07He pressed his forehead to mine

00:54:08For a long moment he did not move

00:54:10He simply breathed

00:54:12Then he picked me up off the bench carefully

00:54:14With respect to the wound

00:54:15And walked me out of the library

00:54:17Past the wall of Narcissus

00:54:19Into the foyer

00:54:20He did not put me down at the elevator

00:54:22He carried me into the bedroom

00:54:23He set me

00:54:24Slowly

00:54:25On the edge of the bed

00:54:26He knelt on the floor in front of me

00:54:28He took both my hands

00:54:29I am not gonna do anything tonight

00:54:31That I will not still be doing the night I die

00:54:33He looked up at me

00:54:34But I would like

00:54:35Tonight to ask you one thing

00:54:37Marry me

00:54:38The cranes

00:54:39In the library down the hall

00:54:40Turned slowly on their threads in the draft

00:54:42From the open window

00:54:45Yes

00:54:48Damien yes

00:54:49He did not let me go to Alaska alone

00:54:51We had agreed

00:54:52Weeks earlier

00:54:53That he would not come

00:54:54He had said it himself in the kitchen

00:54:56That the right answer for my career was yes

00:54:58And the right answer for his heart was no

00:55:00And that he would not be the one who decided

00:55:02Which side of the snow line I slept on

00:55:04He had meant it

00:55:05He had also

00:55:06The same night he meant it

00:55:07Started building a contingency

00:55:09I found out about the contingency on the morning of April

00:55:122nd

00:55:13He came into the breakfast room with a folder under his arm

00:55:16And set it down next to my coffee

00:55:17Sloney

00:55:19Hmm

00:55:20Crane Industries has launched a polar research division

00:55:24When

00:55:27Last week

00:55:30Damien

00:55:30The division is headquarters out of Anchorage

00:55:33It is funding three independent scientific teams

00:55:36Across the Rangel and St. Alaya ranges

00:55:38The director of the division is a 58-year-old former Nenoway scientist

00:55:41Whose hire I personally approved at 3 a.m. on a Sunday

00:55:44The director reports to a vice president of strategic operations

00:55:47Damien

00:55:48The vice president of strategic operations will be working out of a forward base camp

00:55:52In the Ringlish range from April 15th through the close of the field season

00:55:55Damien

00:55:56The vice president of strategic operations me

00:55:58I close the folder

00:55:59You are not coming with me to the field as my boyfriend

00:56:02I am not coming with you to the field as your boyfriend

00:56:04You are coming with me to the field as the vice president of a polar research resension you invented in

00:56:10the last three weeks

00:56:12With cover that will hold up to any audit

00:56:15Damien

00:56:16I will sleep in a separate module

00:56:17I will not interfere with your team

00:56:19I will not be on your your radio frequency

00:56:20I will, however, be 300 yards away every night you are in the field

00:56:24You did not have to do this

00:56:26I had to do this

00:56:29Why?

00:56:29He sat down across from me

00:56:31He took my left hand

00:56:32He looked at the signet ring he had slid onto it the night of the surgery

00:56:36And never asked back

00:56:37Because the last time you went to that mountain without me

00:56:40You came home with a hole in your chest

00:56:41I am not living through that twice

00:56:43I can take care of myself

00:56:45I know you can

00:56:47I am asking

00:56:48Please

00:56:49For the rest of my life to never have to find out again

00:56:52I looked at him for a long moment

00:56:53I had spent seven years asking a man to follow me to airports

00:56:56I now had a man who would follow me to ice

00:56:59All right

00:56:59He brought my hand to his mouth

00:57:03Thank you

00:57:04We landed in Anchorage on April 15th

00:57:07He had flown commercial

00:57:08Three days ahead of me

00:57:09To maintain the cover

00:57:10He met me at the airport in a Crane Industries parka with a name tag that said D

00:57:15Crane

00:57:15VP Strategic Ops and a face so neutral that even I almost believed it

00:57:20He shook my hand at the gate

00:57:21He did not kiss me

00:57:22He carried my carry-on to the SUV

00:57:24In the SUV

00:57:25With the doors closed and the windows tinted

00:57:28He took my face in both hands and kissed me as if he had not seen me in a year

00:57:31Three days was too long

00:57:35Damien

00:57:35I am revising the cover

00:57:37I will be sleeping in your module

00:57:39That defeats the cover

00:57:41I do not care

00:57:44Damien

00:57:44Three days Sloan

00:57:46He kissed me again

00:57:47The cover, for the record

00:57:49Held

00:57:49The cold weather medic worked it out the first night

00:57:52Finn worked it out the second

00:57:54Briggs, who had transported me out of the equipment crate at Wrangell in February

00:57:58Worked it out before we even landed

00:58:00Nobody said anything

00:58:01Nobody had to

00:58:02Damien did not hide that he watched me work

00:58:05Damien did not hide that he ate every meal next to me

00:58:08Damien did not hide that when I came back from the day's transects with snow in my hair

00:58:11He met me at the door of the heated module with a towel he had warmed by the stove

00:58:15The team, by week two, simply absorbed him

00:58:18Finn said it best

00:58:19Late one night in the operations module

00:58:21After Damien had stepped out to take a call

00:58:24Sloan

00:58:25Hmm?

00:58:26I have seen a lot of men love a lot of women

00:58:28I have never seen one love a woman like that

00:58:30Like what?

00:58:32Like you are the only currency he has ever wanted

00:58:35I did not have an answer for that

00:58:36Finn went back to his clipboard

00:58:38Damien came back in

00:58:39He sat down next to me

00:58:41He set a fresh cup of tea at my elbow without asking

00:58:43He glanced at the medical chart on my clipboard

00:58:46Frowned slightly at one number on it

00:58:48And said

00:58:48Pulse is up

00:58:49I just walked in from the field

00:58:51That is not field walk pulse

00:58:54Damien

00:58:54I would like the medic to look at you tonight

00:58:56The medic looked at me that night

00:58:57The pulse was

00:58:58As it turned out

00:59:00Fine

00:59:00Damien did not apologize for asking

00:59:03In the third week

00:59:04I learned about the foundations

00:59:05I learned about them by accident

00:59:07The way I had learned about the wall of Narcissus

00:59:10And the box of cranes

00:59:11And the bound copies of every paper I had ever published

00:59:14He did not volunteer

00:59:15The

00:59:16Information

00:59:16I found it by following a thread

00:59:18The thread was a small thank you note from a graduate student in Cape Town that arrived at base camp

00:59:23by satellite mail

00:59:24The student had received a stipend from the Polar Atlas Foundation to attend a conference where I had given a

00:59:30keynote four years earlier

00:59:31The note was effusive

00:59:32It thanked me for the body of work and the foundation for the stipend

00:59:35I had never heard of the Polar Atlas Foundation

00:59:38I looked it up

00:59:39Polar Atlas Foundation had given approximately $800,000 over the past nine years in small individual stipends to graduate students

00:59:47in glaciology, climate science, and polar geophysics

00:59:51The recipient list was a precise map of every young researcher whose work had any tangential connection to mine

00:59:56The foundation's board was three people

00:59:58None of them I had heard of

01:00:00I traced the LLC behind the foundation through three jurisdictions

01:00:03It was Damien's

01:00:04I traced four other foundations through the same pattern

01:00:07Northern Light Trust

01:00:09Ice and Salt Initiative

01:00:10The 1,962 Foundation

01:00:14Named

01:00:15I realized

01:00:16For the year of the lock at the lake house

01:00:18The Whitfield Adjacent Fellowship

01:00:20Together

01:00:20They had quietly dispersed about $11,000,000 to young scientists in fields adjacent to mine

01:00:26I confronted him about it that night in our module

01:00:28He did not deny it

01:00:30Damien

01:00:31I funded your students

01:00:34I do not have students

01:00:35You will

01:00:38I funded the field you were going to lead

01:00:44Damien

01:00:45He took my hand

01:00:46I have been preparing the ground, Sloan

01:00:48For a long time

01:00:49I built the foundation network the same way I built the apartment in the wall

01:00:52Not for you to notice

01:00:54For you to land in

01:00:55When you are ready

01:00:56When you announce your own laboratory next year and you will

01:00:58Every promising postdoc in the discipline will already have a personal reason to apply to you

01:01:02I did not stack the dare because I did not trust you to win without it

01:01:05I stacked it because I would rather you not have to fight for what should have been handed to you

01:01:09seven years ago

01:01:09Damien

01:01:10Yes

01:01:11There is no part of my life

01:01:13You have not been holding up from underneath

01:01:15There is no part of you, Sloan

01:01:17I am not willing to hold up from underneath

01:01:18In the fourth week

01:01:19He showed me Reagan's file

01:01:21He had not brought it up since we landed

01:01:23He brought it up only because

01:01:25That morning

01:01:26An emergency message had come through the satellite system

01:01:29A tabloid in New York had published a photograph of me being carried

01:01:32By Damien

01:01:33Off the medevac in February

01:01:35The photograph had been bought from a freelancer who had snuck onto the helipad

01:01:39The caption beneath the photo was a quote attributed

01:01:42Anonymously

01:01:43To a close friend of Reagan Snow

01:01:45Suggesting that I had been romantically pursuing Damien Crane during my seven-year relationship with Preston

01:01:50Damien read it to me at breakfast

01:01:52He did not raise his voice

01:01:53He set down the satellite tablet

01:01:55He picked up his coffee

01:01:57He took a slow sip

01:02:00Sklone

01:02:02Damien

01:02:02I am withdrawing my offer to leave her alone

01:02:05Damien

01:02:06She violated the no contact clause when she planted the quote

01:02:09That is now her problem, not mine

01:02:10The deferred prosecution agreement is forfeit

01:02:12She will be charged with the underlying fraud on Monday

01:02:15The federal investigation into her undergray with funding will be opened on Tuesday

01:02:19I would like to do one additional thing

01:02:21He looked at me

01:02:22I would like to release the recording

01:02:23The full one

01:02:24The recording Reagan's midnight phone call from the Wrangell command tent had been used in the ethics hearing

01:02:30And in Preston's case

01:02:31But the full audio had never been made public

01:02:33The two-minute clip the press had covered had only contained the part about the journal

01:02:37The remaining 90 seconds contained the part where she had called me stupid for thinking money could buy a man

01:02:42The part where she had described, in detail, the strategy of waiting for me to humiliate myself into walking away

01:02:49The part where she had laughed

01:02:51Release it

01:02:52He did not blink

01:02:53All of it?

01:02:54All of it

01:02:55To the same outlet that ran the tabloid quote

01:02:57To the same outlet

01:02:59He took out his satellite phone

01:03:01He made one call

01:03:02The call lasted four minutes

01:03:04By dinner

01:03:05The recording was up

01:03:06By midnight

01:03:07It had been picked up by every major outlet that had covered the original audit

01:03:11By the next morning

01:03:12The tabloid that had run the quote had retracted it

01:03:14By the end of the week

01:03:15The publishing house that had originally pulled Reagan's book deal

01:03:18Had publicly announced that it had also voided her advance contract for any future work

01:03:23Reagan's snow did not surface in public again

01:03:25Damien did not say anything about it

01:03:27He did not have to

01:03:29He had told me, weeks ago

01:03:30That there had never been a moment in our entire acquaintance when I was unprotected

01:03:34I was beginning, finally, to understand exactly what that had meant

01:03:39I drilled Whitfield one the same day the recording went live

01:03:42We had not planned the timing

01:03:43The team had simply gotten to the site in the rotation

01:03:46And the weather had cooperated

01:03:48And Briggs had said

01:03:49That morning

01:03:50Today is your day

01:03:51Damien insisted on coming

01:03:53He had not pressed to be on any other field site with me

01:03:55He had stayed within his cover

01:03:57He had let me work without his shadow on my shoulder

01:03:59On the morning of Whitfield one

01:04:01He did not ask permission

01:04:03He came

01:04:04He carried the equipment up the ridge himself

01:04:06Even though Briggs had two team members ready to do it

01:04:09He stood ten feet away while I drilled

01:04:11He did not speak

01:04:12I drilled

01:04:13I logged the call

01:04:14I labeled it

01:04:15I stood up

01:04:15I turned to look at him

01:04:16He was watching me the way he had watched me come off the medevac at Teterboro a year before

01:04:21Not breathing

01:04:22Not blinking

01:04:23Counting

01:04:23With his thumb pressed unconsciously to the inside of his own wrist

01:04:27Where he had once pressed it to mine

01:04:29Damien

01:04:31Hmm

01:04:31I am alright

01:04:33I know

01:04:36This is the spot

01:04:37I know

01:04:39This is where I called you

01:04:41This is where you called me

01:04:42He took a step closer

01:04:43He looked down at the snow

01:04:45He looked at the small rise where the equipment crate had been

01:04:47He looked at the lee of the outcrop where the walls had moved through

01:04:50Then he knelt

01:04:51He did not cry

01:04:52He pressed his palm flat to the snow

01:04:53The way a person might press a palm to a grave

01:04:56He stayed there for a long moment

01:04:57When he stood

01:04:58His glove was wet through

01:04:59He took my hand

01:05:00I would like to ask you something

01:05:02Ask

01:05:03I would like to ask you to come back to this spot

01:05:05Every year with me

01:05:06On the anniversary for the rest of our lives

01:05:08Not because it was the worst day

01:05:10Because it was the day you called me

01:05:11That is the day I want to keep

01:05:13I closed my hand around his

01:05:15Every year

01:05:17Every year

01:05:18Alright

01:05:18Briggs

01:05:1920 feet away

01:05:20Very politely

01:05:21Turned his back to give us privacy

01:05:23We stayed at Whitfield one for 10 more minutes

01:05:25When we walked back down the ridge

01:05:26Damien did not let go of my hand

01:05:29Briggs did not say anything about that either

01:05:31We came home on May 28th

01:05:33He had said

01:05:34The night before we landed

01:05:35That he wanted to be the one who drove me back from the airport

01:05:38He had said it the way he said most things now calmly

01:05:41With the assumption that I would not object

01:05:43I did not object

01:05:44He drove me back from Teterboro at 6am

01:05:47On a Tuesday in late spring

01:05:49The apartment

01:05:50When we walked into the foyer

01:05:51Had changed

01:05:52The wall of cause the one he had commissioned for me in March was the same

01:05:56The wall of Narcissus

01:05:57Opposite

01:05:58Was the same

01:05:59The piano was the same

01:06:00The library

01:06:01Three rooms down

01:06:02Was the same

01:06:03The bedroom had changed

01:06:04He had moved his things in

01:06:06His shoes by the door

01:06:07His charcoal pullover folded over the back of the reading chair

01:06:10His book on the bedside table on what had become

01:06:13In the last two months

01:06:14His side

01:06:15Sloan

01:06:17Damien

01:06:17I am not asking permission

01:06:19I am not asking you to

01:06:20He smiled

01:06:21It was the first full

01:06:22Unmanaged smile I had ever seen on his face

01:06:25He set my carry-on down by the door

01:06:27He picked me up

01:06:28I have had a small panic

01:06:29Every day

01:06:30For six weeks

01:06:31That you would change your mind on the plane

01:06:33I did not change my mind

01:06:34I know that now

01:06:36Damien

01:06:36Put me down

01:06:37No

01:06:38I can walk

01:06:39I know

01:06:40He carried me through the foyer

01:06:42Past the wall of cause

01:06:43Into the bedroom

01:06:44He set me

01:06:45Very carefully

01:06:46On the edge of the bed

01:06:47He knelt in front of me

01:06:48He took both my hands

01:06:50He looked up at me for a long moment

01:06:52I would like to ask you the question I told you I was gonna ask you in the winter

01:06:56Damien

01:06:57It is May

01:06:58I cannot wait until the winter

01:06:59It's May

01:07:01Sloan

01:07:01He reached into his pocket

01:07:03He took out a small velvet box

01:07:05He did not place it on the piano this time

01:07:07He opened it

01:07:08Inside

01:07:09On a small bed of pale cream silk

01:07:11Was a ring

01:07:12It was not the kind of ring I would have expected

01:07:14Not from him

01:07:15Not from a man who could have walked into any jeweler in Manhattan

01:07:18And chosen any stone in the city

01:07:20It was a small

01:07:21Deliberate band of brushed gold

01:07:23Set into it

01:07:24Almost flush

01:07:25Was a single pale yellow sapphire

01:07:27The color of winter narcissus

01:07:29I knew the stone

01:07:30I knew the stone

01:07:31Because it had been in my mother's locket

01:07:33The locket she had worn the day she died

01:07:35The locket my father had been keeping in a velvet bag in a drawer in his desk for 18 years

01:07:40Damien

01:07:41I asked your father six months ago

01:07:44Damien

01:07:45He gave it to me with both hands

01:07:48Damien

01:07:49Sloanie Whitfield

01:07:50Damien

01:07:51I will say it twice if I have to

01:07:54Say it

01:07:56I have loved you for a very long time

01:07:59I built a life with one room in it

01:08:01The room had no furniture and no light and one chair facing the door

01:08:04I sat in the chair year after year

01:08:06I sat in it through three engagements I refused

01:08:09I sat in it through your seven years with another man

01:08:11I sat in it through the night your mother died

01:08:14And the night you graduated

01:08:15And the night I painted the wall

01:08:17I sat in it on the afternoon you called me from a mountain in Alaska

01:08:21I have not been in that room since the day I picked you up off the floor of that tent

01:08:25The room is gone now Sloane

01:08:27The whole house is yours

01:08:29Marry me

01:08:30I had thought for months that when this moment came I would say something simple

01:08:35I had thought I would say yes

01:08:37I had thought I would say yes because the word was small and complete and did not need

01:08:41any of the surrounding architecture

01:08:42Instead I sat on the edge of his bed in his apartment in front of the wall of cores he

01:08:47had commissioned for me holding my mother's yellow sapphire on its brushed gold band

01:08:51And I started to cry

01:08:52I had not cried since the helicopter

01:08:54I cried now

01:08:55He did not move

01:08:56He did not say a word

01:08:58He let me cry

01:08:59After a long time

01:09:00I said it

01:09:02Yes

01:09:03He closed his eyes once he opened them

01:09:05Say it again

01:09:07Yes

01:09:09Again

01:09:11Yes Damien yes

01:09:13He slid the ring onto my fourth finger

01:09:15Above the signet he had given me in the hospital

01:09:17The brushed gold was warm

01:09:19The yellow sapphire caught the morning light coming in off the east river

01:09:22He stayed kneeling

01:09:23He pressed his forehead to my knees

01:09:25I bent forward

01:09:26I rested my forehead against the crown of his head

01:09:29We stayed like that

01:09:30In the bedroom in his apartment

01:09:31For a long time

01:09:32After a while

01:09:33He stood up

01:09:34He picked me up off the edge of the bed

01:09:36He did not

01:09:37This time

01:09:38Set me down anywhere

01:09:39He carried me to the south windows

01:09:41He stood there

01:09:42Holding me

01:09:43Looking out at the city

01:09:44Mrs. Crane

01:09:47Damien

01:09:47I am rehearsing

01:09:49Rehearse it once more

01:09:52Mrs. Crane

01:09:53Yes Damien

01:09:54He smiled into my hair

01:09:56He did not put me down for the rest of the morning

01:09:58We were married in November

01:10:00He gave me

01:10:01In the months between

01:10:02The kind of wedding that a man who has been planning a wedding in his head for a long time

01:10:06Gives a woman who has been allowing herself to imagine one for 10 weeks

01:10:09Which is to say

01:10:10A small wedding

01:10:11I had thought he would want a large one

01:10:13He could have filled every cathedral in Manhattan

01:10:16He did not

01:10:17He picked the lake house

01:10:18He picked a Saturday in late November

01:10:20When the first snow was due

01:10:21He picked the porch

01:10:22He invited my father

01:10:24Three of his cousins

01:10:25Garcia

01:10:26Briggs

01:10:27Finn

01:10:27My two graduate cohort co-investigators

01:10:30The cold weather medic

01:10:31The surgeon who had patched my lung

01:10:33And the National Science Foundation chair

01:10:35That was the entire guest list

01:10:36His mother was not invited

01:10:38She wrote him a letter the week before the wedding

01:10:40He returned it unopened

01:10:42He did not tell me he had returned it

01:10:44Garcia mentioned it

01:10:45In passing

01:10:46On the morning of the wedding

01:10:47The way she mentioned most logistical details

01:10:49I asked him about it that afternoon

01:10:51In the bedroom

01:10:52While I was getting dressed

01:10:53He buttoned his cuff

01:10:55He did not look up

01:10:56Damien

01:10:57She asked

01:10:58Two months ago

01:10:59If she could attend

01:11:00And?

01:11:02I told her she would be welcome the day she apologized to you

01:11:05She did not

01:11:07She did not

01:11:09Damien

01:11:11Sloan

01:11:13She is your mother

01:11:14She had thirty years to be my mother

01:11:16She used that time to try to take you from me

01:11:18I am not paying her interest on a debt she did not service

01:11:21He buttoned the second cuff

01:11:22When she is ready to apologize to you she may come to dinner

01:11:25Until then she may live with what she chose

01:11:28I crossed the room

01:11:29I straightened his tie

01:11:30Slowly

01:11:30With both hands

01:11:32Damien

01:11:32Hmm

01:11:34I love you

01:11:35He caught my hands at his collar

01:11:37He kissed both wrists

01:11:38One after the other

01:11:39Mrs. Crane

01:11:40Not yet

01:11:41In forty-three minutes

01:11:42Forty-three

01:11:43I have been counting since six a.m.

01:11:45He kissed me on the forehead

01:11:46He turned me toward the door

01:11:48Your father is waiting downstairs

01:11:49All right

01:11:50Sklonen

01:11:51Hmm?

01:11:52Walk slowly

01:11:52Why?

01:11:53Because the next time you walk through a door toward me you are mine

01:11:55I would like to remember every second of it

01:11:57He cried at the ceremony

01:11:59I had not expected him to

01:12:00I had not thought it possible

01:12:02He had been

01:12:03For the entirety of the time I had known him

01:12:05A man who had not visibly cried at a funeral

01:12:08A wedding

01:12:08A court ruling

01:12:09Or a press conference

01:12:11He had stood at his father's gravesite

01:12:13And not shed a tear

01:12:14He cried on the porch of the lake house

01:12:16On a Saturday in November

01:12:17When he saw me come around the corner of the house

01:12:19In my mother's dress

01:12:20My father saw it first

01:12:21He squeezed my elbow

01:12:23Look at him

01:12:24I looked

01:12:25Damien was standing at the end of the porch

01:12:27In front of the open front door

01:12:29The brass lock

01:12:30The lock that had held since the house was built

01:12:32Was just behind him

01:12:33His hands were clasped in front of him

01:12:35His eyes were closed

01:12:36Tears were moving

01:12:37Slowly

01:12:38Down his cheeks

01:12:39He did not wipe them

01:12:40He opened his eyes

01:12:42When I was three steps away

01:12:43He smiled

01:12:44It was the smile of a man

01:12:45Who had been waiting a long time to use it

01:12:47My father set my hand into his

01:12:50Damien

01:12:52Sir

01:12:52She is yours

01:12:54Sir

01:12:55She always was

01:12:56Dad smiled

01:12:57He took his seat in the front row

01:12:59The officiant

01:13:00A friend of the family

01:13:01Who had married my parents

01:13:02In the same spot long ago

01:13:04Said a few words

01:13:05He spoke about commitment

01:13:06He spoke about the longevity of love

01:13:08That has been quietly held

01:13:09He spoke

01:13:10Briefly

01:13:11About my mother

01:13:12Who had taught him to make soda bread

01:13:13When he was a young man

01:13:14Then he said

01:13:15Damien

01:13:17Your vows

01:13:17Damien took both my hands

01:13:19Sloan Whitfield

01:13:20Damien Crane

01:13:21I have loved you for a very long time

01:13:23I kept a small notebook

01:13:24The notebook had in it

01:13:26Everything I learned about you

01:13:27That nobody else knew

01:13:27The way you held your fork

01:13:28The way you closed a door

01:13:30So it did not click

01:13:31The way you ate the corners

01:13:32Of a sandwich first

01:13:33The way you bit your thumb

01:13:34Before you took an exam

01:13:35I do not need the notebook anymore

01:13:37The porch was very quiet

01:13:38He went on

01:13:39I am keeping it for our daughter

01:13:41I vow to love you

01:13:42With the precision

01:13:43And the patience

01:13:43Of a man who has practiced

01:13:45I vow to defend you

01:13:46The way I have always defended you

01:13:47Which is publicly

01:13:48Immediately

01:13:49And without negotiation

01:13:50I vow to bring you tea

01:13:51Every morning

01:13:52And to play the piano

01:13:53For you every night

01:13:53I vow to come home for dinner

01:13:55Every night

01:13:56For the rest of my life

01:13:57I vow to never

01:13:58Under any circumstances

01:13:59Let you walk out of a room

01:14:00Without telling you first

01:14:01That I love you

01:14:02That is what I have for you Sloan

01:14:03The rest is yours to ask for

01:14:04I said my vows

01:14:05I do not remember them

01:14:07I remember only that

01:14:08When the officiant said

01:14:09You may kiss the bride

01:14:10Damien did not move quickly

01:14:12He moved very slowly

01:14:13He cupped my face

01:14:14The way he had cupped it

01:14:15The day he came up

01:14:16Off the floor

01:14:17Of the tent in Ringlaw

01:14:18He kissed me

01:14:19The first snow began

01:14:20On cue

01:14:21Behind him

01:14:22We did not have a reception

01:14:24We had dinner

01:14:25Twelve of us

01:14:26Around a long wooden table

01:14:27In the dining room

01:14:28Of the lake house

01:14:29With two of my cousins

01:14:30And my father

01:14:31And Garcia

01:14:31And Briggs

01:14:32And Finn

01:14:32And the medic

01:14:33And the surgeon

01:14:33And the National Science

01:14:34Foundation chair

01:14:35Who had brought his wife

01:14:36The food was simple

01:14:38The wine was old

01:14:39The conversation moved

01:14:40The way conversations

01:14:41At lake houses move

01:14:43In slow loops

01:14:44That did not need

01:14:44Anywhere to go

01:14:45After dinner

01:14:46Damien played the piano

01:14:47He played the eight notes

01:14:49My mother used to hum

01:14:50He played the second

01:14:51Eight notes he had written

01:14:52For me alone in his apartment

01:14:53While I had been in

01:14:54Alaska drilling

01:14:55Whitfield 1

01:14:56He played a third set

01:14:57Of eight notes

01:14:58I had never heard

01:14:59He stopped after

01:15:00The third set

01:15:00He turned to me

01:15:01That one I wrote

01:15:02This morning

01:15:03When this morning?

01:15:054am

01:15:07Damien

01:15:07I will write you

01:15:09A new eight notes

01:15:09Every morning of our marriage

01:15:12Damien

01:15:13I have already started counting

01:15:15Around midnight

01:15:16The guests went to bed

01:15:17In the guest rooms upstairs

01:15:18Damien took my hand

01:15:19He led me out the front door

01:15:21Onto the porch

01:15:22And down the gravel drive

01:15:23To the boathouse

01:15:24At the edge of the lake

01:15:25The boathouse was lit

01:15:26With a single lamp

01:15:27He had had it cleaned

01:15:28He had had a single chair

01:15:30Placed inside it

01:15:31By the window facing the water

01:15:32He had hung

01:15:33And I almost laughed

01:15:34When I saw it

01:15:35Every single one

01:15:36Of the thousand cranes

01:15:37From the apartment library

01:15:38They hung from the ceiling

01:15:39Of the boathouse

01:15:40In soft drifts

01:15:41Of pale yellow

01:15:42And the lamp lit them

01:15:43From below

01:15:43He stood with me

01:15:44In the doorway

01:15:45Sloan

01:15:47Damien

01:15:48This is the last thing

01:15:48The last thing

01:15:49Every other thing I have done

01:15:50Over all this time

01:15:51I have done quietly

01:15:52I have folded a rain

01:15:53I have painted a wall

01:15:54I have learned a piece of music

01:15:55I have bought a building

01:15:56I have built a foundation network

01:15:57I have refused a marriage

01:15:58I did all of it quietly

01:16:00Because you were not yet mine

01:16:01This is the last thing

01:16:02I do quietly

01:16:03He turned me to face him

01:16:04From tomorrow

01:16:04I do everything loudly

01:16:05I bring you flowers

01:16:07In front of every restaurant

01:16:07I hold your hand

01:16:08At every board meeting

01:16:09I introduce you

01:16:10At every event in this city

01:16:11As my wife

01:16:11For the rest of my life

01:16:13Tell me you understand

01:16:15I understand

01:16:17Sloan

01:16:18Welcome home

01:16:19He cupped my face

01:16:20In both hands

01:16:21He kissed me slowly

01:16:22The way he had kissed me

01:16:24On the porch

01:16:24And behind him

01:16:25The thousand cranes

01:16:27Turned slowly in the draft

01:16:28I had spent seven years

01:16:29Thinking my life

01:16:30Was a story about

01:16:31Being seen by the wrong man

01:16:32It had been

01:16:33All along

01:16:34A story about being held up

01:16:36From underneath

01:16:36By the right one

01:16:37The right one

01:16:38Was holding me

01:16:39Now

01:16:39In a boathouse

01:16:40At the edge of a lake

01:16:41At midnight in November

01:16:42In front of 1,000 paper wishes

01:16:44He had folded for me

01:16:45Before he was 30 years old

01:16:46The wish I had folded

01:16:48Into the last crane

01:16:49Months ago

01:16:50Had been that I had not

01:16:51Taken so long to see him

01:16:52The wish I made now

01:16:53Standing in the doorway

01:16:55Was that I would have

01:16:56A lifetime war

01:16:57The end

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