Liam was late. She sat at the kitchen table with a cup of lukewarm tea and watched the snow begin to cover the bedraggled lawn furniture in the backyard, furniture she had neglected to drag into the garage. Low mounds of snow formed on the seats of the chairs and on the top of the picnic table. A dusting of white began to cover the branches of the young pine and white cedar trees in the corner of the yard. She and Liam had planted them two years before, when they had made the move to the suburbs and first purchased the colonial on Sheffield Street. She remembered how scared she had been by the sudden, adult responsibility of mortgage payments. But there had also been her exhilaration at the prospects of settling down, of finding some permanence.

It was growing darker by the minute. Harder sheets of snow, falling without pause, now completely blocked the weak afternoon sun. She looked to the row of houses beyond the line of oaks in their back yard, and saw that only one had any lights on. She finished her cup of tea. The mug had grown cold to her touch and the last few sips had a cool, milky aftertaste.

The sound of the furnace turning on in the basement startled her. She shivered involuntarily, thinking about how cold it might be outside that night. They had enjoyed a balmy, warmer-than-usual fall, with a prolonged Indian summer, and she hadn't welcomed the arrival of cold weather. But she did love the first few hours of a snowstorm, when the snow covered the dingy, late fall landscape with white purity.

She went to the refrigerator and found a half-full bottle of white wine on the bottom shelf, a Chardonnay from a Napa Valley winery. It was one of the wines they had bought at the local liquor store after a wine-tasting party in Cambridge a few years before, when Liam had been interested in learning about wines. They had even subscribed to a wine newsletter for a while until Liam realized that Marie didn't really share his enthusiasm for the details of vineyard management. She poured herself a glass and took a long drink. It warmed her throat and stomach. She finished it too quickly and poured another.

Still no sign of Liam. He was usually punctual to a fault. Liam could be counted on to be on time; he was rarely late, didn't forget appointments. Marie wasn't as reliable herself. The snow must be snarling the early evening rush hour traffic, she decided.

She turned on the radio on the counter and found the classical music station; it was playing one of Mozart's piano concertos. She tried listening, but the majesty of the music, its precision and clarity, somehow made her feel insignificant and sad. She didn't want to start crying again, so she turned the radio off. Besides, she wanted to listen for the sound of Liam's car coming down the driveway. She fought the temptation to look out at the driveway, remembering her grandmother's cliché about a watched pot not boiling. She wondered whether it held true for a watched driveway.

The snow must have muffled the sounds of his tires on gravel, because she only first heard him stamping his boots on the back mat, clearing them of snow. He carefully placed his leather briefcase on the floor and pulled off his trench coat, hanging it in the corner closet. He was impatient to be inside, in the warmth and light of the kitchen.

"Hey," he said in greeting. "It's really coming down, now. Route 128 is a mess. A lot of spin outs. Slow going all the way. That's why I'm late."

"It's not supposed to be more than a couple of inches," she said. "That's all they forecast."

"Another lousy forecast from our crack local TV weatherguys. They should try throwing darts or using chicken bones and dice. They'd probably get better results."

He looked over at the wine bottle on the kitchen table and her half-finished glass. There was a quarter of the bottle left.

"Would you like a glass of wine?" she asked, seeing his glance.

"No," he said. "Not right now."

"How was work?"

"Same old same old," he said. "For the most part." He joined her at the kitchen table. "But we closed two searches today. A real top-notch group of candidates. Experienced, technologically savvy. One of them is sure to get placed. Bruce is really pleased, and he thinks it'll mean a lot more business next year."

She nodded, feigning an interest in Liam's work that was deeper than she really felt at the moment. She was glad that Liam enjoyed what he did for a living, the challenge of finding the right candidate, of calling strangers and trying to persuade them to interview for a new position in an unfamiliar company. Liam was very good at it, which surprised Marie, because she hadn't ever thought of him as a salesman.

"How was your day?" he asked.

"Very quiet," she said, deciding to wait before talking about her afternoon. "Felicia Bainbridge called this morning." She tried to keep her tone neutral, matter-of-fact. Liam didn't like Felicia.

"Did she."

"She invited us over to their place in two weeks. A Saturday. There are two other couples coming."

"What's the occasion?" he asked.

"No occasion. Felicia is just being social. You know we haven't seen them in months."

"I thought you had lunch with her a couple of weeks ago."

"I did. We went to a Mexican place in Cambridge, on Mass Ave. We must have had three Margaritas each and two baskets of those tortilla chips. We had a great time." She was flushed with the memory.

"But we haven't seen them since the summer," she continued. "We as a couple, I mean. Phil's been traveling a lot this fall, and Felicia said this was the first clear weekend in a while."

"Who are the other people she has invited?"

"I think they're both from Felicia's neighborhood in Cambridge."

"Great," he said, drawing out the word in the slow way he did when he was annoyed. "I can see I'm going to fit in perfectly. Perfectly."

"Your enthusiasm is infectious."

"Sorry. I don't mean to be a jerk, but you know that I don't have a lot in common with Felicia Bainbridge. Or Phil Bainbridge. Their friends are going to have similar interests. I know you like Felicia and she's a good friend, but I always feel two steps behind in the conversation."

"That's not so," she said. "I don't see that at all."

"We don't have a lot in common," he said. "I mean, I don't have a lot in common with them."

Liam felt uncomfortable around her old friends from graduate school, especially the more affluent ones. She tried to be patient about his insecurities. Liam remained convinced that he didn't fit in, no matter how many times she reassured him.

"I thought it might be a chance to get out," she said. "Otherwise, I'm going to go crazy. Stir crazy, isn't that what it's called?"

"That's it," he said. "Stir is slang for prison. It's going crazy over being confined."

"How did you know that?"

"I read it in a slang dictionary once," he said.

"You know the strangest things."

"One of my hidden strengths."

"I think we could have a great time with Felicia and Phil," she said. "We'll meet some new people as well."

"You're right," he said, relenting, his tone softening. "It will get us out. So let's go. And I'll do my best to be charming and witty. You'll have to remind me of the names of all those ski resorts in Colorado that Felicia always seems to be visiting."

"Don't agree to go just on my account," she said.

"Isn't that a good reason?" he asked. "A valid one?"

"Perhaps for you," she said. "But I don't want you to feel that you're being dragged to Felicia's kicking and screaming."

"No screaming," he said, smiling at her. "You won't have to drag me there. I promise."

"Okay," she said.

"What are we going to do about Christmas?" he asked. "It's only three weeks away and Sean has been asking."

They had been to her brother's house in Baltimore for Thanksgiving and so, she knew, Liam expected that she would agree to visit his brother on Christmas. Marie had hoped that somehow they could beg off, because she didn't find the Callinan clan's Thanksgiving or Christmas gathering to be relaxing, or welcoming.

Liam's family had never warmed up to her; they saw her as an outsider. Marie wasn't Catholic, her family hadn't originally immigrated from Ireland, she hadn't been born at St. Margaret's Womens Hospital, nor had she grown up in a triple-decker in Dorchester playing with the other neighborhood kids in McConnell or Savin Hill Park or on Malibu Beach. She didn't share the Callinan memories of Christmas Eve midnight mass at St. William's.

Even though Liam's brothers and sister had settled in comfortable suburbs like Hingham and Norwell and all had good jobs -- Sean was a stockbroker, Colin a certified public accountant, and Grace a cardiac nurse at Mass General -- they were still clannish, and fiercely proud, about where they had come from. Marie wasn't O.F.D. -- Originally From Dorchester -- and there was no way to alter that. They wouldn't ever fully include her. Alone among the Callinans Liam didn't seem to care about the old neighborhood, but he did care about joining his family for the holidays.

"I don't know," she said. "We'd talked about having Christmas alone. Just the two of us."

He didn't say anything in response. His annoyance was wordless.

"Can we talk about it more?" she asked. "I'm not sure yet."

"What aren't you sure about? You want me to find time for Felicia's dinner party, but we're going to put Sean and Jean off, and they're family. At Christmas."

"I don't want to fight," she said.

"I'm not looking to fight," he said.

"You could have fooled me."

"It's just that my family will expect us. I think Sean will be hurt if we turn him down when we're staying here. It's different when we're away for Christmas."

She knew Liam was right about Sean: he'd take it personally if they didn't join them for Christmas, see it as a snub. She would be blamed, of course. Sean's Irish paranoia was the worst in the family. Liam had joked once that Sean believed that most of the world, outside his tight circle of family and friends, secretly wore orange underwear on St. Patrick's Day. Marie didn't really understand the sense of persecution. She had grown up in a sedate little town in Maryland outside Annapolis where no one seemed passionate about anything.

They had spent one Christmas in the Bahamas, the first year they were married. Marie loved being away, fleeing that year's dismal December rain for the sun and warmth of Nassau. It had been carefree and romantic, a second honeymoon, and she hadn't missed the traditional Christmas celebrations at all.

But when they got back to Boston, Sean and Colin had needled Liam about the trip at the next family gathering, at Sean's house in Hingham, on New Year's Day. "Liam, the jet setter," Sean began. "Club Med, was it, over the Christmas break? The Caribbean? A wicked good vacation spot."

"The Bahamas," said Liam. "Nassau. Not Club Med."

"Excuse me," Sean said, and then with the broadest South Boston accent he could manufacture. "The Bah-hah-mas." They all laughed and Liam just shook his head. Liam's own accent surfaced only when he was tired or angry or under stress. Marie had teased him once that if Boston was cut off from the rest of the country for fifty years, no one would believe that the locals were still speaking English.

"Lay off him," Colin said. "He needs that January tan to impress his clients."

Sean wasn't done, though. "Will his schedule let him join his brothers for a Bruins game in a couple of weeks?" he asked, using the English pronunciation of "schedule," provoking more laughter. "Can he fit us in between his international trips?"

"Hey," said Liam. "Wait a minute. You're the Wall Street stock market hot shot. You're the one with the hefty net worth. I can't help it if you're so tight that you can't bring yourself to spend any of it. Jean's wanted to take a vacation someplace warm for years. And she's not thinking of Brewster."

Colin sputtered with laughter. "He nailed you," he said to Sean. "Admit it. Someplace warm, but not Brewster. That's priceless." Sean had purchased a Cape summer home in Brewster five years before, but it was a joke in the family how reluctantly he'd made the investment.

Marie had loved the witty interplay between Liam and his brothers. She wasn't witty herself and she was attracted to their dark, Celtic humor, even if Sean's joking implied a criticism of her influence on Liam. She just wanted the Callinan byplay in smaller doses than did Liam.

She didn't respond to Liam's question about their Christmas plans, and, impatient, he went upstairs to change. Marie finished her glass of wine and then emptied what was left in the bottle into her glass. She didn't want to face Liam's disapproving look when he returned, so she put the empty bottle back into the refrigerator. She positioned it behind the milk where he would have to take it out to realize that it was empty. She'd dump it in the trash the next morning, after he'd gone to work.

She began preparing omelettes for their dinner. She heard the sound of the shower upstairs. She made their omelettes swiftly, chopping the cheddar cheese, tomatoes and leeks, and then folding those ingredients into the eggs she was cooking on her big cast-iron skillet. Meanwhile, their English muffins were browning in the toaster oven. She made Liam a cup of instant coffee and brewed herself another cup of tea. She felt slightly dizzy from the wine.

He came down the back steps to the kitchen, his hair still wet from the shower. He had changed out of his navy blazer and gray flannel trousers into jeans and a turtleneck. Liam looked fit in his causal clothing. He was proud of his trim waistline, the product of weekend running and weight-lifting twice a week over at the YMCA fitness center.

They sat down at the kitchen table and she served the food. Liam gave her a wan smile. She knew he wouldn't question her about Sean's invitation again.

"One of my favorites," he said, pleased. "I could smell the eggs cooking upstairs. I'm starved."

"Can I get you anything else?" she asked.

"How about a glass of that wine now?"

"We don't have anything really cold," she said, embarrassed. "Do you mind some at room temperature?"

"That would be fine," he said.

She went to the kitchen closet and found another bottle of the Chardonnay; it was cold just from contact with the outside wall. She poured him a glass and was tempted to add to hers, but knew it would bother Liam, so she didn't. They ate at the kitchen table, silently.

They were near the end of the dinner -- she had finished her omelette and was sipping her tea -- when she told him about her afternoon. She told him that she had started a new decorating project, scraping the wallpaper from the upstairs bathroom walls. Her plan was to repaint the walls in an oil-based enamel; she had gone to the paint store and picked out Dutch Boy Shaker White, a more subtle color.

"I scraped about half the wall," she said.

"I saw when I was taking my shower."

"Halfway through I started crying," she said. "It was a song on the radio I was listening to. I know it's irrational but I couldn't help myself."

"It made you cry?" He put down his fork, disturbed by her comment.

"It doesn't take much. I couldn't stop for about twenty minutes. I gave up doing any more scraping."

"You're still fragile," he said. "Hell, I'm still fragile."

"I don't like feeling like this," she said. "I'm sorry to bring you down with me. I need to stop dwelling on it. It's not fair to you."

"Don't be absurd," he said. "It's not a matter of fairness. Whatever you're feeling matters to me because I love you and we're in this together."

"I want to try again," she said. "I'm willing to try. I decided that today. Doctor Attasian said at my last appointment that we could begin trying again, that my body is ready now."

"That's great. That you want to try. But don't you think we should wait? It'd probably be easier on you if we waited a bit."

"Easier?"

"And safer. I don't want to see you disappointed or hurt again."

"So what am I supposed to do? While we're waiting?"

"Why don't you go back to school? Take some courses? Or you could find a job. Or do whatever interests you."

"Those are your solutions," she told him. "That might make sense for you, but not for me."

"At least they're a start. They get you moving forward."

"I'm not sure I want to move forward, if that's what you think moving forward is."

"Then what do you want to do?"

"I told you."

"Other than that."

"I don't know. I feel flat," she said. "Most of the time, I don't feel much of anything. I don't get angry or passionate or upset. The days just go by, and I'm just hoping to get through them."

She was tired of talking. She knew Liam would want to figure out a "solution," and she dreaded that conversation. She didn't believe there were solutions any more. It was where they differed. She accepted the irrationality in life, the sudden ups and downs, and he wouldn't.

"I'm sorry to hear that," he said. "I was hoping things had gotten better. From before."

"They have," she lied. "Some."

"It's going to take time."

"I know," she said. She cleared their plates and placed them in the sink. She washed her hands and dried them with paper toweling.

"I'm going for a walk," she announced.

"Do you want some company?" he asked.

"No," she said. "I'd like to be alone."

Liam nodded, already expecting the response. When she was upset, Marie took walks by herself. She pulled on a fleece vest and parka and added a ski cap and gloves, prepared for the weather.

Outside it was warmer than she'd expected, the falling snow giving the air a soft, moist feel. She decided that she would walk a long way. She hoped that she could empty her mind, that she could think of nothing but the whiteness of the snow and the hush of the night around her.

She began walking, finding her way more by instinct than by conscious navigation, aware of her breathing and the perspiration that gathered under her shirt as she trudged ahead.

She looked at her watch. To her surprise, she discovered that she had been walking for an hour, oblivious to the time. She had made a long loop through the town center, past the Common and then west by the pond and the new middle school, and then back through the recently completed townhouse development where many of the houses had five bedrooms and three baths and were already covered with Christmas lights, until she reached the edge of her neighborhood. To the west was a large open expanse of fields, the outside boundaries of a local nature preserve, and a dark stand of trees. Snow covered the ground although it was dark and hard to see because the only illumination came from the streetlights.

She thought about how she could wander off into the woods and vanish, disappearing from the life she was leading. How long would it be before Liam reported her gone? Would the police find her tracks heading across the field? Would they mount a search, bringing in dogs and helicopters to scour the surrounding nature preserve? Would the detectives suspect Liam of "foul play," of having killed her and hid the body? Or would they conclude that depressed, she had walked away in a suicidal funk? Would anyone think she had fled to California or Mexico, escaping the winter chill and her current life? What would the neighbors say? And her friends? She found herself grinning at the absurdity of it.

She walked back down the street and turned the corner at Sheffield. From there she could see the living room windows of their house. Reflected blue light from their television set flickered on the window. Liam must have grown bored of waiting for her return. He would be on the recliner, his feet propped up, watching television and glancing through the Globe. On most nights she would be there too, on the nearby couch, with her latest book or cross-stitching, usually ignoring whatever was on the television, content to just be there. Occasionally Liam would find something of interest in the newspaper and read it out loud to her, but for the most part they didn't talk, content with the comfortable proximity.

Marie had been exploring poetry again. She had paperbacks of verse by Adrienne Rich, John Ashbury and Gary Snyder on the corner table. She had been reading Robinson Jeffers, as well, and just within the week had been struck by a poem of his,"Carmel Point," and its opening line, "The extraordinary patience of things." She had wondered what he had been driving at, because the words couldn't mean anything in a literal sense. How could things be patient? Or better yet, why would things be extraordinarily patient? Marie loved the ambiguity of the poem. She longed for that patience, the quiet, non-judgmental patience of things.

She had no wish to go back inside the house, just yet. She stood at the edge of the street, lost in thought, mesmerized by the lights, and then was startled by her name being called out loud. She looked up and saw a Volvo station wagon stopped in the street, its brake lights on and the window rolled down. The driver had called her name.

She saw that it was Mr. Perkins, the earnest man who lived in the powder-blue Colonial up the street, the house with the porch that wrapped around its front. She remembered that he had something to do with software and computers and that he loved to garden. In the spring, he was the first on their street to start ministering to flower beds and shrubs ravaged by the New England winter.

"Marie?" he called. "Is that you, Marie?"

"It's me," she called back. "It's Marie."

He put the station wagon in reverse and slowly, cautiously, rolled back, bringing the car to a stop so that the front driver's side window was parallel with her. "Is everything all right?" he asked, peering at her through the snow.

"Yes," she said. "I'm fine."

"I saw someone standing there and not moving and I thought..." Perkins let his words trail off. "I thought it was you but I wasn't sure."

"It's me," she said. "I'm just enjoying the quiet and the snow. Thanks for stopping, but there's nothing to worry about."

"Looks like we're getting more snow than we bargained for."

"That we are," she said. "Every time it snows I think about how we were taught in grammar school that the Eskimos have 35 different words for snow. But the truth is that they don't. They have just one, like us. Liam researched that when he was in college. Another one of those popular myths that isn't true."

"I didn't know that," he said politely, but Marie could see that he was puzzled by her comment. She had just wanted to make conversation, to reassure him that she was all right.

"Thanks for stopping," she said, repeating herself. "I don't want to keep you."

"Fine," he said, relieved that he had done the neighborly thing and could continue on his way, his conscience clear. "I'm sorry if I startled you. Take care, then." He rolled up the window and slowly pulled away from her, the tires' treads leaving a fresh pattern in the snow.

She stood there, watching Mr. Perkins' station wagon with its "Visualize Peace" bumper sticker and the Martha's Vineyard parking decals on the back window slowly negotiate its way down the street and then disappear from view into the snow. He would probably remark to his wife Chloe that he had found Marie standing in the street, and Chloe, a sharp, hard-edged woman with a demanding career of her own, would no doubt conclude that Marie and Liam were having problems. Not the first, nor the last, in their neighborhood.

The couple who had lived four houses up the street, the Lanigans, had divorced a year ago. First there had been a trial separation, with Bryce Lanigan moving out of the house. Months later Marie had seen him at the Star Market, grocery shopping by himself. Lanigan had a haggard and lost look, like he hadn't had a decent meal in weeks. Marie had heard from Chloe Perkins that Renee Lanigan's doubles tennis partner, a young woman who had also divorced her husband, had been staying with Renee. Chloe had commented about how "unusual" Renee's relationship with her friend seemed, but Marie had ignored her and had changed the subject. Before too long, the Lanigans were gone. They sold their house to a young orthopedic surgeon affiliated with Children's Hospital, finalized their divorce, and disappeared from Sheffield Street and the town.

She thought about the snow piling up on the front walk and the driveway. In the morning she would get up before Liam and head outside and shovel the driveway clean so he could get his car out. She looked forward to that, to losing herself in hard, physical work, in the half-hour or so it would take to clear the snow down to the dark asphalt.

She felt as if she could see and hear more clearly. She thought she could hear the downward rushing of the snow, making a hissing sound so faint that she wondered if she was imagining it. Did snow have a sound? That would be a good Robinson Jeffers poem, she thought. Then she heard the sound of the wind moving the trees in their backyard, the hint of creaking branches, the feel of snow blown onto her face, a cool mist.

She opened her mouth and impulsively stuck her tongue out. She caught some of the snowflakes on her tongue, enjoying the sudden wetness, and delighting in the childishness of the gesture. She decided that she would wait until Liam was asleep before she re-entered the house. She didn't mind waiting.