Carla drove me to Pine Lake that June. The cabin was small, with a screened porch, a blue kitchen, and two rocking chairs facing the water. Henry had painted the walls himself, one weekend at a time, while telling me he was at the hardware store. A neighbor, Mr. Okafor, said Henry had visited every month, always alone, always whistling, and had left a flowerpot for me by the door.

The letters were not instructions. Each one was only a few lines, written during the months of his illness. One described the first day we met. Another told me where he kept the spare fuses. One said, “Do not sell the Chevy. It likes you.” I read one on the anniversary, one when the roses bloomed, and one in July, after a thunderstorm kept me awake. They felt like a man sitting in the next chair.

When I opened the last envelope, in September, it did not tell me where to go. It said, “Ruthie, you have been wonderful to me for forty-four years. Now be wonderful to yourself. Learn to swim, which you always said you would. Invite people to the porch. Dance with someone who steps on your foot.” I put the page against my chest, and I sat on that porch until the stars came out.

I did learn to swim, in a cold lake, with a patient instructor named Gloria, who is seventy. Every summer weekend now, the cabin fills with our daughter, her children, and half our old church hall. At dusk, I put on the scratchy record of “Moon River.” A man named Walter from down the road has stepped on my foot twice, and I have decided to let him try again.