Speaker 1: Rain tapped at the bedroom windows, an uneven rhythm that
Speaker 1: made ME think of all the Saturday's Lena and I
Speaker 1: used to spent tangled up under the comforter, ignoring alarms
Speaker 1: and dead lines, one of us always finding a way
Speaker 1: to justify another hour together. Now the covers were smooth
Speaker 1: and cold beside me. My eyes blinked, picking up the
Speaker 1: blur of early light filtering through the gray. But what
Speaker 1: woke me for good was the Zipperlina, using her back
Speaker 1: back clothes careful, as if she hoped I'd sleep through
Speaker 1: her retreat. She moved around the room of practice silence.
Speaker 1: The sound of her butts, new stiffer than her old sneakers,
Speaker 1: disturbed the floorwards. She tugged the laces tighter, as fixed
Speaker 1: on a spot on as she could see. I let
Speaker 1: my breathing stay slow, just to watch her a moment.
Speaker 1: The sight of Lena in technical fabric were still strange.
Speaker 1: She used to joke that she would only wear moisture
Speaker 1: wicking shirts if someone paid her, But lately it was
Speaker 1: like a different version of her had taken up residence.
Speaker 1: All stream mined, monochrum, hair cought back in a low
Speaker 1: buried her features set in a kind of purposeful piece.
Speaker 1: Maybe a purposeful was the word for the whole transformation.
Speaker 1: She moved with intent now instead of the sleepy chaos
Speaker 1: I'd always loved. My phone buzzed on the knights in
Speaker 1: de Morgan's ridiculous Old CAP's meme of a cat working
Speaker 1: from bed, and Lena startled, looking at me over the
Speaker 1: bed's edge. Sorry if I woke you, she whispered, as
Speaker 1: if she wasn't the one packing at six thirty on
Speaker 1: a Saturday in the room we used to claim was
Speaker 1: arsanchiri from any one's schedule. I stretched, making a show
Speaker 1: of waking up hiking again. She gave a light, apologetic laugh.
Speaker 1: Rain supposed to let up by ten, good weather, for
Speaker 1: it actually fewer people. She oysted, her pack on to
Speaker 1: her shoulders. You sure ye don't want to come? She
Speaker 1: looked at me then, with those wide, careful eyes. Her
Speaker 1: tone was playful, but the invitation didn't sound real. For
Speaker 1: months now this had become a kind of dance, me
Speaker 1: volunteering to join her. How deflicting with that same gentle logic.
Speaker 1: Solo hikes are my therapy, babe, she'd say, it's my
Speaker 1: only quiet these days. That morning. I tried again. If
Speaker 1: ye want company, I can snag my boots. We haven't
Speaker 1: done a proper trail together in a well, you know,
Speaker 1: Lena smiled. Something strange flickered behind it. You die on
Speaker 1: these clients. I need to clear my head, just me
Speaker 1: and my podcast. Que Rain's not really your thing, right.
Speaker 1: Her lips brushed my forehead, quick and light, already tasting
Speaker 1: of distance. I'll bring you back a pastry or something
Speaker 1: a few months ago. Weekend belong to us, routine and
Speaker 1: a thousand tiny joys, even if detts hovered and Lina's
Speaker 1: worked demanded every scrap of her ambition. She'd always grumbled
Speaker 1: about the time she lost distress, book, our e mails,
Speaker 1: group texts, the expectations of a sales firm that measured
Speaker 1: loyalty in ours as much as numbers. But hiking Lina
Speaker 1: would pass or make a show of roughing it with me,
Speaker 1: just for laughs. I was the one who took photos
Speaker 1: of weird lichen and river rocks. Her idea of nature was,
Speaker 1: as she often said, dining al fresco with the racetant
Speaker 1: three bars of Wi Fi. I dragged myself up, following
Speaker 1: her to the door. Raindrops streaked the hallway window, painting
Speaker 1: the light on her jacket and watery silver. Lina was
Speaker 1: already half way out before she paused, looking back, as
Speaker 1: if trying to remember a ritual she'd forgotten. You'll get
Speaker 1: your miles in editing, right, she joked, then ducked her
Speaker 1: head and left the foe or I could reply. For
Speaker 1: several minutes, the apartment felt airless, as though the shemid
Speaker 1: silence after her departure was itself a question. This is
Speaker 1: just what people meant by growing in new directions? Or
Speaker 1: was it something else, something she was not saying. The
Speaker 1: silence in her explanations deeper than the quiet she claimed
Speaker 1: to need. I went to the kitchen, made coffee I
Speaker 1: didn't want, and tried not to read too much into
Speaker 1: an empty Saturday. There'd been nothing dramatic, no fights, no
Speaker 1: slam indoors, no cruel words. She had said she needed
Speaker 1: the hikes for her mental health, especially after her father's
Speaker 1: diagnosis and the way her new firms showed through its staff.
Speaker 1: I believed her, or wanted to stelle. I caught myself
Speaker 1: counting the little changes as afforditing signs from a letter
Speaker 1: I hoped would balance out Our history made this tension
Speaker 1: more confusing, not less. We'd been married six years mad
Speaker 1: as junior employees at the digital marketing agency before Lena
Speaker 1: made the lead to sales and I stumbled into a
Speaker 1: patchwork of freelance design gigs. Lina was magnetic. She had
Speaker 1: that risk skill of turning her room her way with
Speaker 1: just the story, and she made friends everywhere, from the
Speaker 1: line at the co op to business lunches with CEO types.
Speaker 1: It was one of the first things that drew me
Speaker 1: to her, that wild, contagious energy. Compared to her, I
Speaker 1: sometimes felt half formed, too anxious, too hesitant to take
Speaker 1: risks that didn't come with the blueprint. She couldn't sit still.
Speaker 1: I built my career around finding beauty in the ordinary,
Speaker 1: slow days. The only time she was ever quiet, ever
Speaker 1: truly content to be still, was with me, or so
Speaker 1: I thought. Our life together was constructed around small, stubborn rituals,
Speaker 1: the Friday night movie marathons, even when we debad for
Speaker 1: an hour about went to stream cooking elaborate meals, only
Speaker 1: to end up eating cheese and crackers on the porch
Speaker 1: because neither of us wanted to clean pans at two
Speaker 1: in the morning. My best memories were those semi impromptu
Speaker 1: camping trips when I Draggline out of bed at fave
Speaker 1: m for a trail at somewhere, bribing her with coffee
Speaker 1: in the promise of rare birds or sunrise she'd grown
Speaker 1: about but secretly enjoyed. It was easy to believe we
Speaker 1: were invincible during those early years, even the bad months
Speaker 1: when my clients would vanish and rent felt like a threat,
Speaker 1: Lena would PLoP herself next to me on the living
Speaker 1: room floor spread she spread out, telling me we'll figure
Speaker 1: it out, and we always did. When her when it
Speaker 1: came those weeks when just opening her and books made
Speaker 1: her crowd, I was the one who banned electronics at
Speaker 1: dinner and drew the line in the sand as first work.
Speaker 1: Second when her father's diagnosis arrived, I watched her job
Speaker 1: a hospital visits with breaking cordially records, saw her sleepless
Speaker 1: resolve how should vanish into the bath room for late
Speaker 1: night calls with her mother? If I asked how she
Speaker 1: was holding up, should simply say it helps having you
Speaker 1: to come home to if I'm honess, Though, I started
Speaker 1: to feel like maybe I didn't fit lean as well
Speaker 1: as neatly as before. Her new company had a kind
Speaker 1: of cult energy. They all worked hard, played hard, celebrated
Speaker 1: whens over top as and bottomless Mimosas she started coming
Speaker 1: home with jokes about work famb and tech bros with
Speaker 1: startup world stamina. The inside reference is multiplied Suddenly, just
Speaker 1: me and my team, or you wouldn't get at sales weirdness.
Speaker 1: I like some of her colleagues well enough, occasionally joined
Speaker 1: her for after work drinks, where I'd hover at the perimeter,
Speaker 1: smiling at stories I only half understood. My own social
Speaker 1: circle was Luci Morgan, my oldest friend who relish gossip
Speaker 1: and painted for non profit auctions, plus a handful of
Speaker 1: design budd is scattered across different cities, Group DM Banter
Speaker 1: place of any real community. We'd both sidestep messy family drama,
Speaker 1: each choosing to draw a boundaries wider where our marriage
Speaker 1: could be its own island. Well, that's what I wanted
Speaker 1: to believe until lately, when the island felt more like
Speaker 1: a sandbar, shrinking with every incoming tide. It wasn't just
Speaker 1: the hiking. Lena's days became more subdivided. Appointments stacked new
Speaker 1: hobbies discussed in passing but not explained a yoga retreat
Speaker 1: with her office one weekend, a one has challenged the
Speaker 1: next her phone was never far away, now screened down
Speaker 1: on the table, notifications pulsing in a private code. I
Speaker 1: tried to let it go, told myself it was new
Speaker 1: stresser's new habits, nothing more. It's easy to ignore the
Speaker 1: first warning signs in someone you trust, because why would
Speaker 1: you mistress the one person who's always been your tether.
Speaker 1: Still it gnawed at me sitting in oliving room listening
Speaker 1: to that tea kettle shriek. Aline used to yank it
Speaker 1: off the stove, announcing, you're killing the mellow vibe, Alex.
Speaker 1: But I felt the edges blurw what was ours in
Speaker 1: what was now hers alone. Maybe I was the one
Speaker 1: failing to adapt, letting insecurity write the story before it
Speaker 1: even finish being written. I'd almost convince myself none of
Speaker 1: it mattered until the afternoon at the brewery. If I
Speaker 1: had known them what one of fine joke would kick loose,
Speaker 1: maybe I'd have stayed the conversation some as safer. It
Speaker 1: was the quarter leap up kroll an excuse for Lina's
Speaker 1: company and the plus once to end a week some
Speaker 1: with Sticky with spilled beer and cossic rock. I arrival,
Speaker 1: sidling between the bohemoth bancers and the rock's crowd. Lina
Speaker 1: waved me over her energy, bright, already two runs in
Speaker 1: with her team Beside her, Daniel Tan perpetually overjests for Brewerschek,
Speaker 1: one of her favorite work confidants, clinked my glass. There
Speaker 1: he is, Daniel, beaand swaying a little man. Lina's had
Speaker 1: us all dying with her hiking misadventures. What was that
Speaker 1: you said about Wildgot's last Sunday? He laughed, But I
Speaker 1: felt not stumble in my chest. Last Sunday, Lena told
Speaker 1: me she'd hiked alone. Said she needed to clear her
Speaker 1: head after a brutal week. I remembered, word for word,
Speaker 1: just me and my music. Social interaction is banned. She'd return,
Speaker 1: sunburn a little giddy, raving about the view. She brought
Speaker 1: me an apple pastry tea, despite claiming she'd barely seen
Speaker 1: another human all day. I made myself smile. Did she
Speaker 1: finally wrestle the goat or just lose another granola bar?
Speaker 1: Daniel grinned, launching into a story about Lena and a
Speaker 1: Jason doing improv goat noises at the summit. Lena's laughter
Speaker 1: overlapped his, but her gaze flicked quickly away from mine,
Speaker 1: cheeks coloring in the beery light. Some one called for
Speaker 1: group photos, and the moment passed. I drifted into anodd conversation,
Speaker 1: but the words dissolved in my ears. It occurred to
Speaker 1: me that maybe I misunderstood the company was tight knit afell.
Speaker 1: Maybe they'd spraun a surprised group hike bonding for blisters
Speaker 1: and competitive step counts. Or maybe Lena hadn't wanted to
Speaker 1: mention bring company because she'd needed space from me, not
Speaker 1: just from all people. Back home. That night, with Lena
Speaker 1: asleep on the couch, I nearly asked, I ran through
Speaker 1: a dozen versions in my head. Was there group las Sunday?
Speaker 1: I heard a funny story red with Daniel and the team.
Speaker 1: I feared sounding insecure, the jealous bust. So many means
Speaker 1: warn you not to become The last thing I wanted
Speaker 1: was to wedge suspicion between us over what might be
Speaker 1: nothing at all. Instead, I lay beside her, listening to
Speaker 1: her breathe, the way she clutched the edge of the
Speaker 1: blanket and murmur in her sleep. I told myself, it's
Speaker 1: a coincidence, maybe a slip in Daniel's memory. Don't invent shadows,
Speaker 1: but that in his calm to the corners of everything.
Speaker 1: I tried to write it off as stress from my
Speaker 1: own work. More clients drop in budgets, too many late
Speaker 1: nights with nothing to show except and finish designs and
Speaker 1: notes for pitch emails. Still, each new Saturday brought that
Speaker 1: same choreography. Lena up at the dawn, half her gear
Speaker 1: already packed, as if every hour was account on to
Speaker 1: escape the next weekend. I watched more closely as Lena prepared.
Speaker 1: She seemed lighter these days, oddly energized, even as she
Speaker 1: grew more private. She started buying up scale trios. Next,
Speaker 1: there's fancy protein wafers I knew she used to roll
Speaker 1: her eyes up. Now mixed with her usual energy bars,
Speaker 1: the wrappers in the trash runter woul go to flavors either.
Speaker 1: It was subtle, but I noticed things like that packages
Speaker 1: arrived with her name from places I didn't recognize, back
Speaker 1: country Calm, as specialized gear store in Oregon, some shop
Speaker 1: that made thermal mugs for serious ador enthusiasts. Half the
Speaker 1: receipts I'd find crumpled in our recycling. But now and
Speaker 1: then a credit card statement would pop up, sure in
Speaker 1: totals bigger than self cared ever seen. To justify, I
Speaker 1: told myself, she's under pressure at work. Let her have
Speaker 1: her thing. Lena began leaving earlier for hikes, returning later,
Speaker 1: sometimes in a buoyant mood, sometimes thoughtful. She never offered
Speaker 1: stories unless prompted. How were the trails, I'd ask, chill,
Speaker 1: just needed the air, or got random, But that made
Speaker 1: it oddly cathartic. The old Lena would have sent me
Speaker 1: means about the indignity of muddy socks. Now there was
Speaker 1: a glint of secrecy, as if the story couldn't quite
Speaker 1: survive the retelling. Her phone, too, became a kind of fortress.
Speaker 1: Whereas we'd always been loose with boundaries, passing each other
Speaker 1: off screens to show photos, laugh at an awkward email,
Speaker 1: now Lena held her phone closer, laughing at messages but
Speaker 1: not sharing, quick to deflect if I glanced up, just
Speaker 1: Elaine being dramatic again, She'd explain, work chat is out
Speaker 1: of control. One morning, while Lena was in the shower,
Speaker 1: a share calendar, A popped up on our living room, laptop,
Speaker 1: sinking from her work Goggle account, outdoor wellness, high company
Speaker 1: event ad, a M state park lot B. The day
Speaker 1: circled on our fridges. A so low, decompressed Dave for
Speaker 1: Lina coincided perfectly. She'd never mentioned the group hike, just
Speaker 1: that she needed time away that evening. I watched her
Speaker 1: for assign, the way she'd rub her neck when avoiding
Speaker 1: at erect answer the practice breezens in her voice. Was
Speaker 1: your hike today crowded? I asked? She shrugged, noncommittal. No,
Speaker 1: barely anyone braved the rain. I got to just tune out.
Speaker 1: I let it go, but the distance was impossible to ignore.
Speaker 1: I thought about talking to someone Ba, whom the one
Speaker 1: friend had confided in over the yeos. Morgan loved Lena too,
Speaker 1: and I didn't want to seem like I was building
Speaker 1: a case against my own wife. So I let suspicion fester,
Speaker 1: trying to keep it from contaminating whatever trust I still
Speaker 1: wanted to believe. In the next week, Lena's routine shifted
Speaker 1: yet again. She grew affectionate and nowed almost performative. By
Speaker 1: suggesting spontaneous tick out, squeezing my hand, watching TV, sliding
Speaker 1: onto my lap while my laptop balanced on my knees.
Speaker 1: Her kisses were quick but persuasive, like apologetic punctuation at
Speaker 1: the end of a private sentence. Then she bolt for
Speaker 1: a team emergency call or one last email before bed,
Speaker 1: leaving me half certain I'd imagine the entire thing. I
Speaker 1: started to keep mental notes, the sort of thing I'd
Speaker 1: once have found invasive if someone else admitted to it.
Speaker 1: Who was she texting gigling to herself in the laundry room.
Speaker 1: Why did she tense if I asked about simple details
Speaker 1: the weather at the park, the time she laughed? Why
Speaker 1: did she suddenly hate the idea of planning a full
Speaker 1: road trope when it had once been our annual tradition.
Speaker 1: Small things accumulated A receiptful lunch at the Mountain Bucafe
Speaker 1: the same satur day, Lena packed her a dear why
Speaker 1: bento it? And claimed to have sat on a rock
Speaker 1: to eat at the view. The signature wasn't hers on
Speaker 1: the check, but the total was for two. When I asked,
Speaker 1: she breezed past it. Oh, I guess I stopped for
Speaker 1: a coffee before the drive, but honestly, I mostly stopped
Speaker 1: to my snacks. The story didn't line up, but her
Speaker 1: smile was dazzling, and my need not to seem suspicious
Speaker 1: of roude my doubt. One night, after she fell asleep,
Speaker 1: I considered scrolling her phone, convinced myself that suspicion justified breech,
Speaker 1: then stopped. I didn't like what that meant for me,
Speaker 1: For us, I wanted to believe I could still trust her,
Speaker 1: even as the feeling twisted inside me and not tightening.
Speaker 1: Each day, every story conveyed a different shime when re
Speaker 1: excit in the morning, when I mentioned a group packs
Speaker 1: that had heard about Lena, bristled, It's just easier not
Speaker 1: to have to manage conversation, babe, she said, her jaw
Speaker 1: attends as she dried dishes. Is this about you wanting
Speaker 1: me hum again? I really need this time to recharge.
Speaker 1: I worried that my questions would echo her father's judgments,
Speaker 1: his old complaint about letting personal drama interfere with the
Speaker 1: real ambition. The last thing I wanted was to sound
Speaker 1: controlling or jealous. Maybe it was work, maybe I was
Speaker 1: making a stress worse. But then if it was just work,
Speaker 1: why did each new discovery feel like it pushed as
Speaker 1: further into uncharted territory, not closer to a reasonable explanation.
Speaker 1: Desperate to find respective some Russian way to debunk what
Speaker 1: I was now calling the Lina mystery in my mind,
Speaker 1: I reached out to Morgan over coffee, careful to keep
Speaker 1: the turn light. Hey, if you were going to head
Speaker 1: up for a serious hike around here, which trails would
Speaker 1: you pick? Morgan stirred or saw a lotta grinning over
Speaker 1: the rim. I saw Lena last weekend. Actually she looked
Speaker 1: like she was with some work people group thing. I
Speaker 1: didn't want to bother her. She waved, then kept moving,
Speaker 1: classic work mode. I was picking up a print from
Speaker 1: the shop in the parking lot, think smile frozen. Really
Speaker 1: she told me she was doing a decompress alone day. Funny,
Speaker 1: must have been a different Saturday. Morgan shrugged, oblivious to
Speaker 1: my reaction. Maybe she just needed bonding before they climbed
Speaker 1: the quarterly sales mountain or whatever. Her phone buzzed conversations
Speaker 1: whining to more neutral ground. I left the cafe in
Speaker 1: a daze. Either Lena hadn't told me the whole story,
Speaker 1: or she was deliberately keeping her world separate. I couldn't
Speaker 1: tell which would be worse. From that day, the line
Speaker 1: between curiosity and obsession feigned. I started to look for
Speaker 1: contradictions in her words, not because I wanted to catch
Speaker 1: her out, but because I was terrified of missing something
Speaker 1: I shouldn't forgive. Each time Lena grew tender, a private
Speaker 1: guilt seemed to flicker across her face, as if she
Speaker 1: were apologizing in advance for some sinner I wasn't supposed
Speaker 1: to notice. I convinced myself not to escalate things beyond
Speaker 1: what was reasonable. But reasonable was becoming harder to define.
Speaker 1: Was I seeing evidence of betrayal or only what my
Speaker 1: insecurities wanted me to see. One evening, after an unusually
Speaker 1: long hike, Lena texted that she'd be home late, had
Speaker 1: to stop for a work sorry, trafk is trash. When
Speaker 1: she arrived, she was flushed from the cold, dropping her
Speaker 1: bag by the door, barely meeting my eyes. I brought
Speaker 1: you that pastry again, she said, handing it over like
Speaker 1: a piece offering she wasn't sure I'd accept. Later, alone
Speaker 1: in the kitchen, I sorted through the plastic rap and
Speaker 1: knackin from the bakery, tucked into the back, almost like enough,
Speaker 1: I thought was a stamp loyalty card for the cafe.
Speaker 1: Three slots punched out. We'd been there once together, long ago,
Speaker 1: but Lena hated their heavy food. I was left turning
Speaker 1: the card in my hands, wondering who had accompanied her
Speaker 1: enough to collect three punches and barely a month. That night,
Speaker 1: I lay awake, listening to the faint hum of a
Speaker 1: laptop in the living room. I remembered the towns when
Speaker 1: Lena used to call into bed early, pulling my arms
Speaker 1: around her waist, bragging that I was the only thing
Speaker 1: keeping her war. Now there was a gap between us,
Speaker 1: less than a meter wide, but suddenly as profound as
Speaker 1: a canyon. Even the awkward everyday conversation started to sting.
Speaker 1: Tell me a story about work to day. I tried
Speaker 1: one dinner. Lena smiled, absently, flicking her fork against the play.
Speaker 1: Nothing exciting. Team's obsessed with this Wallace challenge, but honestly,
Speaker 1: it's just an excuse to get fresh air between meetings.
Speaker 1: Who leads those? I prodded. She shrugged some contract guide, Jason.
Speaker 1: I think Elene organized it. It's all very corporates. Then
Speaker 1: the way she said his name velprehearsed, as if she
Speaker 1: passed every syllable for the right amount of detail to offer.
Speaker 1: The next week, a padded envelope arrived, marked with a
Speaker 1: return address in Colorado. Inside was a monogram water Bottley.
Speaker 1: I'll peak her initials, the kind of thing a company
Speaker 1: might give to staff, a swag, But Lina's company logo
Speaker 1: was nowhere on it. Her eyes lingered on my face
Speaker 1: as she unwrapped it. They're really going all up for
Speaker 1: wellness branding now, she said, with a brittle laugh. I
Speaker 1: wanted to ignore it. I tried focusing on my freelance gigs,
Speaker 1: convincing myself my restlessness was about work, not us. But
Speaker 1: as Lina's hiking week ends mounted, so did the sense
Speaker 1: that the foundation was eroding under my feet, and I
Speaker 1: was the only one pretending not to notice. Lena's mood
Speaker 1: fluctuated is Sometimes she was expansive, kiddy with affection. Other
Speaker 1: times she seemed one then, going to bed early and
Speaker 1: sighing in her sleep. The oscillation itself became its own
Speaker 1: kind of evidence, though of what I wasn't sure. I
Speaker 1: caught her on the phone late one Thursday, voice softened
Speaker 1: by something more than exhaustion, She saw me standing in
Speaker 1: the hallway and ended the call, quickly putting her phone
Speaker 1: screened down again. It's just Elaine venting about her bonus,
Speaker 1: she explained, but her explanation trailed off. I was going
Speaker 1: glassy Friday night instead of our movie ritual. Lina suggested
Speaker 1: we order in. She poured wine, tried to set a
Speaker 1: playful mood, but half way through the meal she got
Speaker 1: a series of texts that pulled her attention away, each
Speaker 1: time with a new little apology. Just work stuff, she said.
Speaker 1: From hovering until I looked away, I watched as she
Speaker 1: grew cagy, even about Errand's. Once I mentioned I was
Speaker 1: thinking about fixing the camp stove we'd used on our
Speaker 1: lost reel outdoor trip together, wondering a load if I
Speaker 1: should join her on the next hike, she almost snapped,
Speaker 1: I told you I need these on my own. Please
Speaker 1: don't take it personally, Alex. We ate in silence for
Speaker 1: the rest of the meal, both of us reaching out
Speaker 1: but missing the mark. It was Morgan, un knowing as always,
Speaker 1: He gave me the next clue, though she probably thought
Speaker 1: she was closing the subject she sent me a photo
Speaker 1: of Lena at the trail. Ed snapped from a distance,
Speaker 1: meaning to share how boss, my wife looked with all
Speaker 1: her new gear. Your gull is basically outward bound royalty now,
Speaker 1: she texted. In the photo, Lina was talking to a
Speaker 1: man in a green jacket, his hand resting briefly on
Speaker 1: her shoulders. She laughed, Her face was open easy. The
Speaker 1: time stamp was the same as the afternoon. Lena told
Speaker 1: me her hike was coloistood, not us all around. I
Speaker 1: replied with the thumbs up, the pit expanding in my gut.
Speaker 1: That weekend, when Lena left for her hike before sunrise,
Speaker 1: I walked into our bedroom and stood alone. I opened
Speaker 1: her side of the closet, noticing for the first time
Speaker 1: how little of her old casual were was left. The
Speaker 1: flirty blouses and Brett scarves had been replaced by moisture
Speaker 1: wicking layers, neutral tones, technical everything, a live stream line
Speaker 1: for mobility, not comfort. I wondered when she made the switch,
Speaker 1: and why I hadn't noticed the calling as it happened.
Speaker 1: I found her old hiking boots on the floor behind
Speaker 1: a stack of boxes, muddy, worn damb soul splitting at
Speaker 1: the toes. The new pair she bought last month boasted
Speaker 1: gleaming white laces and the faint chemical smells. Something never
Speaker 1: used to wait for real mud I hesitated, looked for
Speaker 1: a receipt, but felt ashamed of the impulse. What would
Speaker 1: I do if I found proof? Would I pack her
Speaker 1: back and walk out? Or would I be the fool
Speaker 1: who stayed hoping explanation would arrive? Just after Dignity departed.
Speaker 1: Back in the kitchen, I caught her lunch batterstaff with
Speaker 1: two Purtin bars, two apples, and two of those luxury
Speaker 1: trail cookies. I never saw her eat at home. I
Speaker 1: stared at the lineup, trying to convince myself she was
Speaker 1: just over prepared. I stood this so long, annually missed
Speaker 1: her return. Lena cheeks flush, hay dowmp from drizzle, a
Speaker 1: ghost of a smile playing at her lips. She brought
Speaker 1: back again a pastry for me, except this time she
Speaker 1: set it down without ceremony. I didn't feel like eating it.
Speaker 1: I know you like their pastries better anyway, she said,
Speaker 1: already moving to the bathroom after she showered, I noticed
Speaker 1: a tiny scratch on her wrists, the sort she'd get
Speaker 1: from brambles or rough rock. I asked about it. She
Speaker 1: glanced down and distracted. Trail was overgrown. I guess I
Speaker 1: should have worn long sleeves. The unknees was nearly physical,
Speaker 1: now a heat climbing my chest. Later was she napped
Speaker 1: on the sofa. I stared at my own reflection in
Speaker 1: the hallway mirror, running through every conversation. Every detail I'd
Speaker 1: once written off as a quirk now reread is a
Speaker 1: possible indicator. I called Morgan again. That man you saw
Speaker 1: with Lena. Did he look familiar? Morgan hesitated, then, honestly,
Speaker 1: I thought he was one of her work pals. I've
Speaker 1: seen him in her Instagram stories with the big beer
Speaker 1: Jason something. They all know him. He's probably just the
Speaker 1: onest guy. She mentioned. If anything was off, i'd have
Speaker 1: told you, I promise, So maybe it was innocent. Team
Speaker 1: hiking friendship. Adults were allowed to have inside jokes and
Speaker 1: new rituals without inviting their spows, But each time I
Speaker 1: let my guard down, another lustrette appeared. That Tuesday, lenikole
Speaker 1: from the living room in that bright voice that meant
Speaker 1: she was choosing one not to say, Babe, what do
Speaker 1: you want from the store. I'll pick up groceries on
Speaker 1: my way home unless you feel like cooking something wild.
Speaker 1: It was something abridge, an ordinary gesture in an increasingly
Speaker 1: unfamiliar place. I wanted to say just you, I want
Speaker 1: you just here, with nothing else in the way, but
Speaker 1: I didn't. I muttered a list and listened to her
Speaker 1: disappeared behind the door, the keys to an echo of distance.
Speaker 1: That evening, doing laundry, I found a business card tucked
Speaker 1: in the pocket of her new rain jacket. A Jason
Speaker 1: Palmer had all Wellness Guide in neat Sarah Faunt on
Speaker 1: the back a note in an unfamiliar hand, you made
Speaker 1: it the best weekend to can't wait for the next time.
Speaker 1: My hand trembled, rage and humiliation blooming in a single,
Speaker 1: sickening rush. I wanted to storm into the living room,
Speaker 1: demand names and dates and explanations, but I stopped. I
Speaker 1: read the note a dozen times. I tried to pass
Speaker 1: its meaning to find plausibility. Maybe it was just professional,
Speaker 1: warm banter, a kind of friendly camaraderie Lena had always attracted.
Speaker 1: Or maybe it was exactly what it looked like proof.
Speaker 1: I closed the pocket, slid the card back, and returned
Speaker 1: to my work, pretending my life was still the one
Speaker 1: I had built with Lina, not the one she spun
Speaker 1: from half Truth's innovation. I washed her sleep that night,
Speaker 1: hair loose over the pillow, lipped a part. I thought
Speaker 1: about the promises we made all those years ago. How
Speaker 1: we be each other's home. I tried to remember the
Speaker 1: last time I'd felt that was really house. In the morning,
Speaker 1: Dina acted as if nothing was out of place. She
Speaker 1: made coffee, kiss me goodbye, who smiled barely pausing. I waited,
Speaker 1: hoping for some crack in her mask'd, some spontaneous confession,
Speaker 1: or even just a sign that all of this had
Speaker 1: gotten too heavy to carry. Instead, Lena was buoyant, insisting
Speaker 1: we do a joint hake the next weekend too reconnect.
Speaker 1: It was as if she sensed her performance was slipping
Speaker 1: and needed to reanchor us in something old, something safe.
Speaker 1: I greet, barely trusting the sound of my own voice.
Speaker 1: As we planned, I heard her cycling for suggestions, finally
Speaker 1: settling on a route she had mentioned a dozen times
Speaker 1: as her favorite, but had always avoided with me before.
Speaker 1: On Saturday, we loaded the car, me with my practical layers,
Speaker 1: her in the new gear she seemed to wear like
Speaker 1: armah It rained. At the trailhead, the well was a
Speaker 1: mesh of fog and pines. For a little while, it
Speaker 1: was easy to let go of my doubt, to lose
Speaker 1: myself in Lina's laughter as she pointed out imaginary danger
Speaker 1: goats down the ridge line. She was sweet, affectionate. By
Speaker 1: the time we reached the lookout, soap and muddy. I
Speaker 1: let myself believe that maybe it was possible to reclaim
Speaker 1: the life we built. Ye see, she said, squeezing my
Speaker 1: hand as we shared a thermis of coffee. This is
Speaker 1: what I needed, just us, no deadlines, no group text,
Speaker 1: no weird energy. She apologized for being distant, blaming work,
Speaker 1: burn out, the general awfulness of modern adulter I know
Speaker 1: it's all looks sketchy lately, she confess, her eyes soft
Speaker 1: and honest, But I swear it's just this pressure. I've
Speaker 1: been hiding how hard it's been because I didn't want
Speaker 1: to worry you. I nodded, feeling the tension loose and fractionally.
Speaker 1: In that moment, it was possible to believe her, to
Speaker 1: believe this new Lino was the same woman I'd married,
Speaker 1: just changed by circumstance, not by some one else. We
Speaker 1: drove home, music playing damp gear in the trunk. That night,
Speaker 1: as she showered, I gathered her jacket and boots to
Speaker 1: dry them. In the pocket, I found it again, the
Speaker 1: business card on the back, the same handwriting, only this
Speaker 1: time the words felt more intimate. You made it the
Speaker 1: best weekend to can't wait for next time. I gripped
Speaker 1: the card, feeling the room spin, the weight of all
Speaker 1: the excuses and careful explanations crashing over me. The next morning,
Speaker 1: Lina was up early, breezing through the apartment. She hummed this.
Speaker 1: She packed her back back, yet again, avoiding my gaze.
Speaker 1: I watched, silent as she moved through our space with
Speaker 1: a familiar new ness, all purpose, all grace. When she left,
Speaker 1: the door closed softly behind her, leaving me with only
Speaker 1: questions and the echo of old trust now dangerously eroded.
Speaker 1: The door closed with more finality than seemed possible from
Speaker 1: something as ordinary as a door. That hollow click rickshaded
Speaker 1: through the apartments, open plan, emptiness, cescling in my joints,
Speaker 1: light dam I gathered every stray sound, dripping coffee, the
Speaker 1: distant grit a tizes on my pavement, the hiss of
Speaker 1: the radiator, but nothing filled the spacely and evacated. Instead
Speaker 1: of starting work, I drifted from room to room, pretending
Speaker 1: I was tidying. I stacked boots, moved her reusable water
Speaker 1: bottle from the window sell to the countertop, lined up
Speaker 1: her Granolla wrappers like puzzle pieces to be examined later.
Speaker 1: I hovered nearer side of the desk, opening the drawers,
Speaker 1: closing them again, and knees preventing me from really searching
Speaker 1: for anything. Each time I paused, intending to do something anything,
Speaker 1: I ended up frozen half, thinking if evidence would append
Speaker 1: my world, or if maybe the well needed appending. At ten,
Speaker 1: I gave up on distraction and opened my laptop, intending
Speaker 1: to pour myself into a deadline. The design software stared back,
Speaker 1: blank and hostile, my cursor blinking in time of my
Speaker 1: aunresolved questions. Morgan sent a meme, some joke about dumps
Speaker 1: of our client briefs. I almost asked whether she remembered
Speaker 1: anything else about the hike, Wishous or Lena, but the
Speaker 1: oaged to reach out for reassurance ran up against the
Speaker 1: wall of my own pride. I erased the half tipe message.
Speaker 1: I wasn't ready to admit to anyone, much less myself,
Speaker 1: that my marriage might be constructed on invention and omission.
Speaker 1: Emails blurred together, deadlines pressed. I ignored them instead as
Speaker 1: call through Instagram, searching for any tag, any clue. Lina's
Speaker 1: profile was neat and curated, private even to me, except
Speaker 1: for the highlights she occasionally shared. Hiking shots had appeared recently,
Speaker 1: seen hery boots, the blurred smear of a trail had signed,
Speaker 1: Never a selfie, never her companions. With an idle thought,
Speaker 1: I clicked on Jason Palm's public account, found through the
Speaker 1: number on the business card. His gride was predictable, men's
Speaker 1: wellness influence, who meets ari I catalog all sunrise vistas
Speaker 1: and beard doll tips. What struck me was that Lena
Speaker 1: had never once mentioned his existence, despite the way he
Speaker 1: documented company hikes, wellness challenges, grinning groups with arms slung
Speaker 1: over each other's shoulders, faces flushed from exertion or maybe laughter.
Speaker 1: In a few pictures, a familiar sleeve or production assue
Speaker 1: stin smuck floated at the edge of the frame. Nothing
Speaker 1: of urrot, but enough if he looked, really looked to
Speaker 1: recognize Lena's hair, the curve of her jaw scen into
Speaker 1: a crowd of strangers. She wasn't tagged, but the comments
Speaker 1: joked about stealth Lena running point or LP with the
Speaker 1: snack hook up. As usual, each code had mentioned supun
Speaker 1: my stomach tighter. I opened her eyepad, as if by accident.
Speaker 1: For months, we'd both used it for Netflix's recipes quick emails.
Speaker 1: I told myself it wasn't a violation, Not really. I
Speaker 1: scrolled through her open tabs, a door Gear forums pre
Speaker 1: order for the new Trail Runners, a u Tube playlist
Speaker 1: with Jason Palmer's name in the title. In the native
Speaker 1: calendar app scattering of blocked out events GP eight fifteen
Speaker 1: meet accompanied highkroutcheck or well as call Jay. The passing
Speaker 1: was too meticulous to be accidental. I closed my eyes,
Speaker 1: trying to summon up a rational explanation. Lena organized things
Speaker 1: to death. Sometimes she could bury logistics in layers just
Speaker 1: to avoid chaos. But her calendar had never been this hidden,
Speaker 1: this systematically stripped of detail. She hadn't shared it with
Speaker 1: me since she'd started at the new fermol that matters
Speaker 1: as Fridays in Netflix Babe. She once shrugged. When had
Speaker 1: all that matters begun to mean? As long as you
Speaker 1: don't look too closely? My phone vibrated. It was a
Speaker 1: message from Lena, a photo of a mountain laurel slick
Speaker 1: with rain, the sky gauzy white. Wish you were here
Speaker 1: to see this bloom. Miss you to day. So I
Speaker 1: stared at the screen, them hovering over a reply, I type,
Speaker 1: I love you, deleted it, bro it looks beautiful. Be safe.
Speaker 1: My own words tasted thin, like a meal made of apology.
Speaker 1: Noon came and went. I hadn't touched my work. I
Speaker 1: called Morgan, as much to steady myself as to fish
Speaker 1: for details. You busy, I asked painting a chicken for
Speaker 1: a silent auction, So defined busy. I managed to laugh
Speaker 1: last time? When you saw Lena hiking, tell me the truth.
Speaker 1: Did she seem off or maybe just distracted? Morgan hesitated,
Speaker 1: Not off, exactly like, she looked happy, actually relaxed in
Speaker 1: a way I haven't seen up parties. She always has
Speaker 1: her guard up, you know, But at there she was different.
Speaker 1: Not that you should read into it. Sometimes the woods
Speaker 1: just do that. Why is she okay? I swallowed, just
Speaker 1: hard to keep up with her lately. She's got this
Speaker 1: whole new world I can't figure out. I think she'd
Speaker 1: tell you something was wrong, Morgan said a little too brightly.
Speaker 1: The tour were alike the Citadel couple or silence. I
Speaker 1: just mean Lena's not the type to play at being married, right,
Speaker 1: I pressed the phone to my ear, closing my eyes. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Right after we hung up, I sat in the stillness,
Speaker 1: the wine of my computer fan drooling the point home.
Speaker 1: Whatever digital ghosts lived in this apartment, none could explain
Speaker 1: away the evidence that kept accumulating. My mind circled the
Speaker 1: same detail again and again. Lena's new affection, the tiny
Speaker 1: sip ups the persistence since that our intimacy was being
Speaker 1: performed for my benefit, as if to buy time, as
Speaker 1: if she could love me enough to raise the necessity
Speaker 1: for confession. That afternoon, I put on my own boots
Speaker 1: of relic from the last time we'd camped together, still
Speaker 1: muddy from last fall, and drove out to the park
Speaker 1: trail head heart hammering. What exactly was I hoping to find?
Speaker 1: I told myself I'd walk clear in my head, maybe
Speaker 1: glimpsed the group from a distance, proved to myselfe Lina
Speaker 1: had nothing to hie. After all, it wasn't as if
Speaker 1: she banned me from the trails. She just tin invite.
Speaker 1: I kept to the wider pass, blending him with the
Speaker 1: Saturday crowd, di stounding every group for Lina's blue shell jacket,
Speaker 1: her stride faster than average, precise, as if she had
Speaker 1: something urgent to reach At each cuve. I waked for
Speaker 1: newly an hour, passing clusters of office types, gossiping retirees
Speaker 1: with wrecking poles, a group of young women bent over
Speaker 1: in that map. No Lina, no Jason, at least not
Speaker 1: to day. I doubled back at the first of a look,
Speaker 1: disappointment and relief warring in my chest. If I'd found
Speaker 1: her with her wellness group, would that have been reassuring
Speaker 1: or confirmation? I couldn't answer that question, not honestly. The
Speaker 1: next Monday, a care package arrived from Lina's ferum insulated mug,
Speaker 1: pruding cookies, even acutesy fridge magnet a door warrior. It
Speaker 1: read in foux hand lettering. I left it on the table,
Speaker 1: unsure whether it was meant for her or some other
Speaker 1: newer version of herself that no longer needed me as
Speaker 1: a co conspirator. That night, as rain clattered out a
Speaker 1: private coat against the windows, Lena reclined on the sofa,
Speaker 1: wipe from her high kin long drive, bare feet propped,
Speaker 1: and now I'm rest. She watched me as I loaded
Speaker 1: the dishwasher, a gaze, lingering a fraction longer than usual,
Speaker 1: as if searching for evidence of suspicion or acceptance. Ere
Speaker 1: quite lately, she said, voice soft, want to talk about it?
Speaker 1: We just want to zone out with a movie. I
Speaker 1: took a slow breath, not trusting myself to answer. I'm
Speaker 1: just tired. She reached out to squeeze my wrist. We
Speaker 1: both are. It feels like I can't shut my brain
Speaker 1: off from this. I get out and sweat these days.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry I haven't been as present. I wanted to
Speaker 1: ask prison for whom for me? Were for hen? But
Speaker 1: I said nothing, only leaning into her touch for a
Speaker 1: long moment, let in the illusion of comfort evaporate. Before
Speaker 1: I could interrogate it, things kept shifting. Lena started talking
Speaker 1: about maybe going on a spring back backing trip with
Speaker 1: the group, making it sound casual, the way she made
Speaker 1: everything sound optional, until you realized she'd already made up
Speaker 1: her mind. Jason's thinking about put together a two day
Speaker 1: thing for people who want the real deal. Minimalis total
Speaker 1: off grid, she said, swirling the last of her malbick.
Speaker 1: I think it'd kicked me back in TI gear. Would
Speaker 1: I even survive a real deal trip? I tried for lightness.
Speaker 1: She gave me a fond side. I glance, half a smile.
Speaker 1: You underrest made yourself. But I think it's better for
Speaker 1: my mental reset if I go with people who don't
Speaker 1: expect me to be lean at the wife. I get
Speaker 1: to just be nothing for a while. You know, I
Speaker 1: thought I was easy to be nothing around, I said,
Speaker 1: more hurt than intended. She set her glass down. Alex,
Speaker 1: do you know these last few months have been hard work?
Speaker 1: My dad? Sometimes I need not haul any one else's
Speaker 1: feelings along with me. I waited for her to burdge
Speaker 1: the gap with a joke, something self effacing. Instead, she
Speaker 1: picked up her phone and retreated into messages, her fingers
Speaker 1: moving fast, her face closing off. The next day, Lena
Speaker 1: lingered by the door in the morning, eyes darting between
Speaker 1: me and the spill of sunlight on the floor. Do
Speaker 1: you want me hom or, she asked so quietly. I
Speaker 1: wondered if I had imagined it. Yes, I admitted. She
Speaker 1: stepped forward, kissed me, knock quite on the lips. I
Speaker 1: do love you. I just need I don't know to
Speaker 1: hit roussette. I guess I watched her go craving a
Speaker 1: fight that didn't materialize, wishing like a forced issue, equally
Speaker 1: wishing I could just believe her alike. Before midweek, I
Speaker 1: took a half hearted dive into work, trying not to
Speaker 1: let my thought spiral between deadlines. An EMIL popped up
Speaker 1: from a client had pitched weeks ago and never heard from.
Speaker 1: Sorry for the radio silence. You've been on retreat, right,
Speaker 1: Lena said, you tuer at that wellness place. Every weekend
Speaker 1: must be nice. Now nought must be nice. Not you too.
Speaker 1: I've tagged a careful reply, short and professional, but my
Speaker 1: mind snag on a new thread. Why did Lina's colleagues
Speaker 1: think I was there too? Had she deliberately conflated our weekends?
Speaker 1: Was it easier to lie to every one? Or was
Speaker 1: she lying to me about her stories for every one else?
Speaker 1: That Friday afternoon, I tried to let go of my paranoia.
Speaker 1: I picked up takeoutlet candles, set up our old projector
Speaker 1: for a movie, hoping to conjure some fragment of comfort.
Speaker 1: When Lina walked in, she looked surprised, almost caught off
Speaker 1: god by the suggestion of romance in her own living room. Fancy,
Speaker 1: she joked, kicking off her shoes. I poured her wine,
Speaker 1: trying to return us to Friday routines. Let's make to
Speaker 1: night All's school, No phone, no distractions, she laughed, exaggerated,
Speaker 1: you want me to go? Aunlocke, Who even a am
Speaker 1: I any more? She handed me her phone with a
Speaker 1: flourish as if daring me to scull, and retreated to
Speaker 1: the kitchen to plait the take out. For a few hours,
Speaker 1: we almost managed normal. We called on to the couch,
Speaker 1: legs tangled, sprips and screens put away. At moments Lena
Speaker 1: caught my eye with a look that jawed me soft
Speaker 1: attentive during the movie, her form buzzed. I passed it
Speaker 1: to her with a raised eyebrow, playful breaking on no
Speaker 1: phone roll already, She blushed, quick thumb the screen, then
Speaker 1: turned it upside down. Just wellness, group, mems, I'll mute it.
Speaker 1: Her laughter seemed authentic. I almost aid, while I still
Speaker 1: had the courage or you sure you haven't been a
Speaker 1: hiding things? But the moment vanished before I could reach
Speaker 1: for it. A little later, as the credits rolled, Lena
Speaker 1: culled against my chest, fingers slipping into mine. In those
Speaker 1: quiet minutes, I wanted nothing more than to believe that
Speaker 1: this Lina, the one latting her breath slow with mine
Speaker 1: not glued to three group chaps, was still the true version.
Speaker 1: She fell asleep early, head heavy on my shoulder. I
Speaker 1: eased out from under her and collected empty glasses, piding
Speaker 1: their urged to check her phone, wrestling instead with my
Speaker 1: better nature. A cleaned up stacked the dishes, then stood
Speaker 1: at the window, rain gathering on the glass, my own
Speaker 1: reflection fractured by the city lights outside. The next morning,
Speaker 1: Lena was up early, humming a she Brewed espressor, swaying
Speaker 1: to a playlist I didn't recognize, but new was Jason's.
Speaker 1: His social media was basically a free Spotify promotional arm.
Speaker 1: I caught her eye and she paused, you mind if
Speaker 1: I leave early to day? She asked, her rhetorical question.
Speaker 1: By now back to the trails, she nodded, already lacing
Speaker 1: her boots. I signed up to lead the warm up. Actually,
Speaker 1: first time feels good to be looked up to, you know,
Speaker 1: proud of you, I said, meaning it and not meaning it.
Speaker 1: At the same time, a phone buzzed. Jason's name flashed
Speaker 1: in the preview. I pretended to look away. She said nothing,
Speaker 1: only slipped the device in her pocket and leaned in,
Speaker 1: pressing her mouth to my cheek before she laughed. For hours,
Speaker 1: I fussed at nothing, a dead lining, nor at a
Speaker 1: coffee munk washed three times, I riplaid all vacations in
Speaker 1: my mind axwell. Lena had complained about books about taphotos,
Speaker 1: never captured the right light about why any one would
Speaker 1: willingly skip brunch for tree sat. Each memory was a
Speaker 1: counterweight to what I saw now, her ease, her competence,
Speaker 1: her visible joy at being some one else's version of
Speaker 1: out Dorsy. By three in the afternoon, the apartment was
Speaker 1: too small to hold my restlessness. I texted Morgan, want
Speaker 1: to meet for a drink? She replied instantly, five of
Speaker 1: them at Harvest. My treat bring emotional baggage. Her jokes
Speaker 1: were always a step ahead of my defenses. At the bar,
Speaker 1: I found myself recounting not suspicions, but half evidence. You
Speaker 1: ever feel like you know some one, then one day
Speaker 1: all their routines change overnight. Morgan fixed me with a quiet,
Speaker 1: appraising look. People go through phases, Alex. But has Lena
Speaker 1: ever lied to you before? No, not that I know of.
Speaker 1: I sip my beer, not about important things. If she is,
Speaker 1: you should ask her, not in a weird way, just
Speaker 1: hope in the door so she can talk. If this
Speaker 1: stuff she doesn't feel like she can say. I almost laughed.
Speaker 1: Ye make it sound easy. I know it's not. But
Speaker 1: also you're her safe lace. Maybe she's Morgan hesitated, voice softening.
Speaker 1: Maybe she's testing whether you'll make space for whatever new
Speaker 1: part of herself she's trying on. I turned that over,
Speaker 1: not sure if it was comforting or just naive. Silence
Speaker 1: gathered between us, heavy as rain clouds. When I returned home,
Speaker 1: Lena was already back, face flushed from the wind, hair
Speaker 1: struggling damp down her face. Her boots and pack were
Speaker 1: by the door, her jacket halfens it. She was smiling
Speaker 1: in that brittle way, determined, tired, but eager to show
Speaker 1: she was present. How was the lead off? I asked,
Speaker 1: easing into the familiar cadence. She brightened a flash of
Speaker 1: the woman I remembered, exhausting, the kind of great Jason says,
Speaker 1: I have a good teacher ibe. We got soaked, but
Speaker 1: everyone loved it. I wanted more details, but she started
Speaker 1: up with questions about my days, shifting us until I bounter.
Speaker 1: For an hour. We skirted everything real It was easier,
Speaker 1: less risk of saying something we couldn't and say later.
Speaker 1: While she was in the shower, I lingered in the doorway,
Speaker 1: looking at the detritus of her hike receipts loose change
Speaker 1: and empty wrapper for trail mixed nor two wrappers. I
Speaker 1: thumbed through her pockets, feeling both guilty and desperate, but
Speaker 1: found nothing over it, just the remains of a day
Speaker 1: spent in the woods. Sunday came and went. We may brunch,
Speaker 1: took a short walk near the river, Lena holding my
Speaker 1: hand with that deliberate tenderness, the kind that felt almost staged,
Speaker 1: as if she was afraid to let me guess how
Speaker 1: far things had moved without me. That night, when she
Speaker 1: drifted off thoroughly, I sad a week and plotted time
Speaker 1: lines the weakened she had been unavailable the moments. Her
Speaker 1: explanations had changed mid sentence, the pattern of newgear purchases,
Speaker 1: tight on charrible adventures. I realized sharply how lonely it
Speaker 1: was to sleep next to some one whose mind was
Speaker 1: soaking a course he could never chart. I wanted to
Speaker 1: wake her, ask for everything, the truth, the story of
Speaker 1: where she gone without me, whether there was anything left
Speaker 1: of us to claim. Instead, I lay still, counting the
Speaker 1: cracks in the ceiling, listening to the city's hatch between storms,
Speaker 1: waiting for the courage to turn suspicion into a confrontation
Speaker 1: that would break something irrevocable. When Monday dawn, Lena wore coming,
Speaker 1: almost too cheerful. Should we do dinner with Daniel in
Speaker 1: a lane this week? They keep asking, or do you
Speaker 1: want it? Just as night, I heard what she was offering, reassurance, normalady,
Speaker 1: the illusion of choice. Let's do just us, I said,
Speaker 1: I've missed it. She smiled, as if they settled everything,
Speaker 1: as if nothing in our world required further examination. But
Speaker 1: even as I agreed, the truth pulse beneath my skin.
Speaker 1: Each question is bluntered. That wouldn't let go. Later that day,
Speaker 1: while Lina was out, I gathered a week's worth of
Speaker 1: receipts from the mail basket, flipping through crumpled squares for
Speaker 1: anything unusual. The Mountain View Cafe appeared again, two sandwiches,
Speaker 1: two coffees on a dais She to wrn she'd packed
Speaker 1: her own food team lunch, read the line in her
Speaker 1: expense note, but no company card was used. Her signature
Speaker 1: was next to a looping jade in some one else's hand.
Speaker 1: I tucked it away and sure whether to confront her
Speaker 1: or keep compiling the d'ssay, my anxious mind demanded by Tuesday.
Speaker 1: Every word she overfelt parse, measured for ambiguity. The gap
Speaker 1: yawned wider with each attempt to bridge it. I resolved
Speaker 1: finally to ask her if right, or, failing that, to
Speaker 1: catch her in a truth so clear it could not
Speaker 1: be denied. That night reinbatted the streets, echoing the tension
Speaker 1: that had grown heavy and humid in our home. Lina arrived,
Speaker 1: sook to, tossing her jacket over her chair and unloading
Speaker 1: her bag by the door. How was your day, I asked,
Speaker 1: Keeping my town cash, she shrugged, hair dripping long, but
Speaker 1: good hit. My numbers dominated the pitch and survived another
Speaker 1: group high Q nothing dramatic, I said, forcing a smile.
Speaker 1: Did you eat out? After she paused quick coffee with
Speaker 1: the crew? Why? I nodded, not pressing. I watched as
Speaker 1: she changed the subject, asking about a client meeting, then
Speaker 1: pouring herself a glass of wine and offering to make
Speaker 1: us a late dinner after we eat, and she reached
Speaker 1: across the table. I know things have been wheeled lately.
Speaker 1: I feel it too, and trying, Alex, I gripped her hand,
Speaker 1: wishing connection could be restored by mutual declaration alone, I know,
Speaker 1: I said softly, but in my mind the questions continued
Speaker 1: to multiply, fared by every slip, every new gap in
Speaker 1: the story she wove. I fell asleep trouble, caught between
Speaker 1: hope and certainty, neither strong enough to carry me, both
Speaker 1: too insistent to quiet. The next day, Jason's name appeared
Speaker 1: in a spam filter in my in books. The company
Speaker 1: white mailoud about a mindful Movement workshop. No mention of Lena,
Speaker 1: but I recognized the trail in the photo at the
Speaker 1: head of a place she said she discovered herself alone
Speaker 1: just a month ago. The wall shifted on its axis,
Speaker 1: tilting further from the place where trust could be assumed,
Speaker 1: where love protected against the worst explanations. I wasn't sure
Speaker 1: how much further I could go without burshing us both
Speaker 1: past the point of repair. But as the day shortened,
Speaker 1: the rain pressing more insistently against the windows, I realized
Speaker 1: the truth had already moved them with us, a third
Speaker 1: prisons in every room, filling the silence where certainty used
Speaker 1: to be. I wandered back through the humming quiet of
Speaker 1: our apartment, muscles tight and sore in a way that
Speaker 1: had nothing to do with hiking. Lena's latest departure had
Speaker 1: been so ordinary, sea to night, I'll text if I'm late,
Speaker 1: But now it sounded like a line from a play.
Speaker 1: I couldn't stop picturing her hand pressing the door close,
Speaker 1: not wanting an audience for whatever version of herself she
Speaker 1: would become once she was beyond my side. The card
Speaker 1: burned in my pockets, corners prickly my thigh through the fabric,
Speaker 1: the words on its back echoing with a force that
Speaker 1: seemed out of proportion to the little rectangle's weight. I
Speaker 1: placed it on the table, My hand hovered over it,
Speaker 1: tempted to snap a photo fire it off to Morgan,
Speaker 1: demand context from some ue neutral, but I didn't want
Speaker 1: a chorus of sympathy or outrage. I wanted clarity. None
Speaker 1: was coming. The apartment, always Leena's stage for reinvention, now
Speaker 1: felt like a waiting room for some diagnosis. Neither of
Speaker 1: us could say out loud. Evidence piled up in drawers
Speaker 1: and pockets. But the greater proof was Lina's absence, the
Speaker 1: fact that the part of her that used to belong
Speaker 1: solely to us was now slouet out in the woods
Speaker 1: with some one else. I thought about texting her something direct,
Speaker 1: Who's Jason Palmer? That that would be too obvious, too soon,
Speaker 1: and I was starting to realize how much I had
Speaker 1: to protect, even from myself. If this was the moment
Speaker 1: my marriage ended, I wanted to be sure I hadn't
Speaker 1: missed a possible answer, that I wasn't sabotaging us with
Speaker 1: nothing more than coincidence and my own insecurity I weeded
Speaker 1: or tried to. I spent the day pacing, opening the
Speaker 1: fridge for no reason, glancing at the window whenever a
Speaker 1: car passed slowly on the Rainslick Street. I couldn't focus
Speaker 1: on work. The words all blowed. Nothing I wrote, felt honest.
Speaker 1: Even Morgan's miens sat unopened. My phone faced down, just
Speaker 1: as Lena always kept hers. Late afternoon, Lina texted Rain
Speaker 1: held off going for tea before I drive back one
Speaker 1: anything for dinner, the pretense of normal life, I told
Speaker 1: her to surprise me. I sat at the table with
Speaker 1: her car, at the receipts, scrolling Jason's social feeds compulsively
Speaker 1: as the light faded and drizzle thickened against the glass.
Speaker 1: When Lean finally returned, it was dusk. She entered with
Speaker 1: practice chair, shaking droplets from her herd, laughing too loudly
Speaker 1: that some jokes should heard in the car. She set
Speaker 1: down a little paperbag, got your weird egg salad. Don't
Speaker 1: say I never spoil you. She stood close, eyes bright,
Speaker 1: expecting to be welcomed. I watched her movements, the studied
Speaker 1: convert of her routines. I wondered if she sensed what
Speaker 1: had shifted while she was gone. Wondered if she'd see
Speaker 1: the cat laid out like an accusation on the table,
Speaker 1: or if she just pocketed it without flinching, Already rehearsed
Speaker 1: for whatever test I might say. Dinner felt manufactured. She
Speaker 1: peppered me with questions about clients, frain, small talk with
Speaker 1: us as its subject, as if reminding herself the marriage
Speaker 1: still existed. Each familiar topic felt weaponized. My work, her
Speaker 1: dad's slow recovery, our mutual irritation at her companies after
Speaker 1: hour's expectations. But when I asked about her hike, her
Speaker 1: hands came cloaked in detail that didn't quite match the
Speaker 1: photos I'd glimpsed online. She talked about fowers in Bloom
Speaker 1: that Jason had posted about two weeks earlier. She described
Speaker 1: a tricky traverse with a lane and the usual group,
Speaker 1: even though Morgan had said Lino was a load apart
Speaker 1: from one man. The more I pressed, the more she
Speaker 1: filled empty spaces with fullness, until I couldn't decide if
Speaker 1: the Gilbert's mind for searching or hers for lying. Later
Speaker 1: that night, she leaned her head on my shoulder while
Speaker 1: we watched TV, fingers trailing along my wrist and murmured,
Speaker 1: you're a million miles away. I almost said it, then
Speaker 1: almost asked about Jason, the notes, the layers of secrecy
Speaker 1: she'd wrapped around her week ends, but I didn't trust
Speaker 1: my voice. Instead, I sat there, letting her touch reassure us,
Speaker 1: both plain the part of a man who didn't already know.
Speaker 1: She fell asleep on the couch, mouthed slack, a thin
Speaker 1: thread of hair lying across her cheek. I covered her
Speaker 1: with a blanket, switched off the lights, and stood alone
Speaker 1: in the dark. Everything around me is staged and hollow
Speaker 1: as a rented apartment. By morning, dred was a persistent
Speaker 1: pressure at the base of my skull. Lina's kisses were
Speaker 1: like practical a habit she could perform half awake. As
Speaker 1: she left for work, I told her, let's talk tonight.
Speaker 1: She smiled and troubled. Sure, babe, love you. All day
Speaker 1: I could barely breathe the hours before she came home,
Speaker 1: stretched shapeless and slow. I went through the motions of
Speaker 1: freelance work, but eachy maa sounded like a foreign language.
Speaker 1: My thoughts slid between hope and certainty. Had I misjudged?
Speaker 1: Was I about to shadow something irreplaceable? In the strength
Speaker 1: of a hunch and a few notes scrawled in a
Speaker 1: stranger's hand, Morgan called, late afternoon, you sound like hell
Speaker 1: you ok? I told her everything. Jason, the card, the
Speaker 1: patterns I'd found in Lena stories, Morgan was quite a
Speaker 1: long moment. Do you want to catch her in a lie?
Speaker 1: Or do you want the truth? Alex, because sometimes as
Speaker 1: aren't the same thing. What would you do? I'd want
Speaker 1: to hear her sayed out loud, lie to my face
Speaker 1: or tell the truth either away. Once it's said, you
Speaker 1: can't go back there? Are you ready for that? I
Speaker 1: didn't answer. When Lena came home that evening, I watched
Speaker 1: her carefully. There was a performance in her every movement,
Speaker 1: a little too much laughter, a joke told too quickly,
Speaker 1: small aggressive kindnesses. She poured me a glass of wine,
Speaker 1: asked about my day. I couldn't sustain the conversation. The
Speaker 1: room spun with tension. I could barely hold down. It
Speaker 1: wasn't fear any more, it was inevitability. I let her
Speaker 1: go through her nightly routine, shower, moisture as are called
Speaker 1: to her mother on speaker, casual, innocent. I waited until
Speaker 1: she finished making tea, until she set her up beside
Speaker 1: mine at the counter. We need to talk, I said.
Speaker 1: She froze the mug halfway to her lips about what
Speaker 1: her voice too light as wide about Jason Palmer. I
Speaker 1: reply something shifted in her face, a flicker, a calculation.
Speaker 1: She set the mug down, gathered herself. Is this what
Speaker 1: you've been building up to? Did you go through my stuff?
Speaker 1: Don't deflect? I laid the business card flat between us
Speaker 1: on the table. I found this the note on the back,
Speaker 1: and I've seen the photos to wellness hikes, your calendar,
Speaker 1: j P meetings, all the weekends you said you were alone.
Speaker 1: She stared at me, breathing hard through her nose, arms
Speaker 1: crossed as if to anchor herself in place. Jason is
Speaker 1: the company's wellness guy. We all use him. Alex, it's
Speaker 1: not the lie. Caught, brittle and doomed, I shook my head.
Speaker 1: I know about the week ends the company hikes, sure,
Speaker 1: but what about the days you ate out together, the
Speaker 1: trail runs just you and him, The way you change everything,
Speaker 1: new gear, new routines, new jokes. I'm not part of. Though.
Speaker 1: You're going to tell me I'm making this up. She
Speaker 1: covered her mouth, eyes full of something, panic, shame, exhaustion.
Speaker 1: I didn't mean for this. It was just supposed to
Speaker 1: be about work. I was burned out, and he she swallowed,
Speaker 1: blinking fast. I needed some one to talk to. Who
Speaker 1: wasn't you. I know that sounds awful. He listens the
Speaker 1: first That's all it was. Then the hike started to
Speaker 1: be about more than exercise. I felt alive out there
Speaker 1: Alex for the first time in months. The honesty was
Speaker 1: an impact, but I pushed on, voice tight. Did you
Speaker 1: sleep with him? She shook her head once, then hesitated.
Speaker 1: We kiss a couple of times. I I let a
Speaker 1: gaf further, not all the way, but enough. I'm not
Speaker 1: even sure where the line is any more. Nothing happened
Speaker 1: until last month, I swear, but it felt real and
Speaker 1: I couldn't stop. And you kept coming home, I said,
Speaker 1: voice trembling, acting like nothing had changed, hiding every part
Speaker 1: that matter. Tears started in her eyes. I didn't want
Speaker 1: to lose you. I told myself it would just ended,
Speaker 1: that the feelings would burn out, but they didn't. I
Speaker 1: was so scared you'd see, you'd know it meant I
Speaker 1: was broken, or that you'd hate me. We still in
Speaker 1: the thick, choking silence that only comes at the edge
Speaker 1: of an ending. My heart was pounding so loud I
Speaker 1: could barely hear. She wiped her nose. FO was harsh.
Speaker 1: I think I needed something to break something I couldn't control.
Speaker 1: I hated being perfect all the time, for work, for you,
Speaker 1: for my dad, with Jason. I don't have to perform.
Speaker 1: I'm with me. You do. Her face twisted, pain, fatigue, regret.
Speaker 1: Sometimes sometimes I don't know how to unwand the expectations
Speaker 1: any more. I know that isn't fair to you. I
Speaker 1: pulled back from the counter knuckles. Why so, what now, Lena,
Speaker 1: are you leaving me for him? She shook her head,
Speaker 1: covering her face with both hands. No, I don't want that.
Speaker 1: I don't even know what I want. I just know
Speaker 1: I can't keep pretending you deserve the truth. The most
Speaker 1: chilling thing was her earnestness. How easily shame split into apology,
Speaker 1: then back into confusion. The person I'd known the rules
Speaker 1: of our old arrangement had already gone. The waald outside
Speaker 1: our window was still so normal. I wanted to smash
Speaker 1: something inside the story of us had narrowed to this.
Speaker 1: The first day Lena didn't lie, and the last day
Speaker 1: I could honestly say I didn't know. I gathered the evidence,
Speaker 1: the receipts of the business, caught all the things that
Speaker 1: had mapped her new world. I set them on the counter.
Speaker 1: This is it, then, I need time away from all
Speaker 1: of this from you. I can't share my home with
Speaker 1: someone who won't choose it. She nodded, tear slipping down
Speaker 1: her face, silent. Neither of us reached for the other.
Speaker 1: There were no hugs, no parting jokes, just the ancient,
Speaker 1: practical loneliness of a marriage coming in tone. I packed
Speaker 1: a duffel in the bedroom. I left her phone charger,
Speaker 1: her favorite Hodie, the mug that said wife Balsa near
Speaker 1: adescent kursef. When I came back to the living room,
Speaker 1: she was sitting at the table, face streaked and empty,
Speaker 1: watching the rain. I turned keys in my hand, text
Speaker 1: me if you need something, I said, My voice form
Speaker 1: are thick. I'll stay at Morgan's. She closed her eyes.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, Alex. I stood in the doorway, not trusting
Speaker 1: myself to say anything more honest. The drive through the
Speaker 1: city was a fog of headlights and red brake lights,
Speaker 1: the radio a blur of static. Morgan's apartment was warm
Speaker 1: and unfamiliar, her kitchen clotted with the evidence of a
Speaker 1: life and disturbed by betrayal. She poured me a drink,
Speaker 1: sat beside me on the couch, neither of us saying
Speaker 1: much for a while. I messaged Lena the next morning,
Speaker 1: please tell your manager I won't join next week's dinner.
Speaker 1: She replied, OK. There was no signature, no heart, not
Speaker 1: even a period. The hour slept sideways. I canceled the
Speaker 1: trip i'd planned for our anniversary. Lena took down all
Speaker 1: her hiking photos from her feed. Jason's name was nowhere
Speaker 1: on the next company roster. I glimpsed our share calender
Speaker 1: was suddenly empty. The first night alone, I made past
Speaker 1: it ate it, standing up in the kitchen, feeling the
Speaker 1: hollow egg of appetite without pleasure. I didn't miss her
Speaker 1: touch so much as the knowledge that the person I
Speaker 1: trusted to return would never be exactly mine again. A
Speaker 1: few days later, we agreed to meet a neutral spot,
Speaker 1: a cafe not far from our building, not one we'd
Speaker 1: over Calldor's, just newful ground. Lena arrived with dark circles
Speaker 1: under her eyes, clutching a battled umbrella. We didn't talk
Speaker 1: about Jason. We talked logistics for picking up some packages,
Speaker 1: me arranging to get my desktop tower later in the week.
Speaker 1: The conversation was honest, mossly, no one lied, not even
Speaker 1: about the small things. At the end, she stood hovering
Speaker 1: by the door. Do you want to come back, even
Speaker 1: just for a few days. I shook my head. I
Speaker 1: don't think that's possible, not now. She nodded, accepting it.
Speaker 1: On the way back, I felt something unfamiliar. Not relief,
Speaker 1: but a kind of slackening, the absence of tensions so
Speaker 1: persistent I had forgotten it was there. When I went
Speaker 1: to the apartment the next afternoon to gather my last things,
Speaker 1: Lina was there, waiting in a living room, surrounded not
Speaker 1: by her hiking gear but by the ordinary mess of papers, houseplints,
Speaker 1: half simucks. She was more herself than she'd been in months,
Speaker 1: or maybe less, a version ped down to something quiet
Speaker 1: and real. We worked in parallel, putting my books in boxes,
Speaker 1: sorting out what belonged to them. It was gentle and sentimental,
Speaker 1: slow when everything was packed, as if my bag scowning
Speaker 1: the room for any sign I had missed, any trinket
Speaker 1: that might anchor me to our former life. She joined
Speaker 1: me at the door, pausing. Her face was tier street
Speaker 1: but calm, pressed with sadness, but also with an odd piece,
Speaker 1: the kind that comes when the worst thing that could
Speaker 1: happen already has, and the story is forced to move on.
Speaker 1: I slipped my key off my ring and placed it
Speaker 1: on the side table, a faint, cling glauder than I expected.
Speaker 1: She stood without reaching for me, only washing, her hands
Speaker 1: folded in front of her, as if she needed to
Speaker 1: physically hold herself together. I hope you find what you're
Speaker 1: looking for, I said, quietly, wherever those trails take you.
Speaker 1: Lena nodded, lips trembling, saying nothing. I opened the door,
Speaker 1: stepped up without looking back, and let a close, soft
Speaker 1: and final behind me. The dust pulled at the city's edges,
Speaker 1: cool and endless. My grip on my bag was steady
Speaker 1: as I moved down the stairs and out into the street.
Speaker 1: The loss everywhed, but less suffocating. In the fading evening.
Speaker 1: What I felt most sharply was not rage, not even heartbreak,
Speaker 1: but the stillness that comes when there is nothing left
Speaker 1: to chase, just space enough finally to breathe. Morgan met
Speaker 1: me in the lobby when I left the apartment for
Speaker 1: the last time. Her arms folded, expression patient, quite, neither
Speaker 1: pressing advice nor performing sympathy. She held the door as
Speaker 1: I stepped into the street, our old canvas back slung
Speaker 1: over one shoulder, at the other hand tid in the
Speaker 1: handle of my battered suit case. There weren't many words
Speaker 1: that felt right. She stayed beside me through the automatic
Speaker 1: glass doors, about on to the pavement, where the city's
Speaker 1: twilight blurred every window and puddle with orangebury. We moved together,
Speaker 1: silent until we reached her car. She didn't offer platitudes. Instead,
Speaker 1: she started the engine, rain dot in the windshield, and
Speaker 1: let music fill the car until the ordinary well crowded
Speaker 1: out the weight of the day. We drove in slow
Speaker 1: circles for an hour, sometimes pulling over, sometimes just letting
Speaker 1: traffic to side our rope. When I did finally speak,
Speaker 1: it wasn't about Lena, or even the split directly, but
Speaker 1: about the strange flatness inside me, the absence where hope
Speaker 1: had been vibrating non stop for so long. Eventually, Morgan
Speaker 1: broke the silence. You're not going to want to hear this,
Speaker 1: but it won't always be raw, Alyx. The worst part
Speaker 1: is right now, when it's undecided. It'll shift. One morning
Speaker 1: you'll wake up and know you're living your actual life again.
Speaker 1: She didn't reach for my hand, didn't urge your response.
Speaker 1: She just let the words settle, as she always had
Speaker 1: one thing's matter most. Her apartment was too warm and alive,
Speaker 1: with evidence of unbroken routines. Two mugs by the sink,
Speaker 1: a paint spattered smock on a chair, grocery lists in
Speaker 1: her unreadable short handpinned above the stove. She made tea.
Speaker 1: I accepted out of habit, craddling the steaming mug in
Speaker 1: both hands, the heated kind of analgesic for the icy
Speaker 1: ache in my stomach. We didn't rehash what Lena had
Speaker 1: said or how the confrontation played out. Morgan simply slid
Speaker 1: a clean pillow on to the fold out and left
Speaker 1: me with a spare charger and permission to exist untethered
Speaker 1: for the night. I tried sleeping, but dreams came broken
Speaker 1: and short fragments of for us, of Lena vanishing between trees,
Speaker 1: of Jason's name on repeating a crowd I couldn't see.
Speaker 1: I woke twice both time's wedding, searching the room for
Speaker 1: a person who no longer wanted to be found. Morning
Speaker 1: brokeray and ordinary. I rode a brief female to client,
Speaker 1: fielded a few logistical texts with Lena about mail forwarding,
Speaker 1: stared at the wall in between the tick of Morgan's
Speaker 1: old kitchen clock. Impossibly, lad Lina's message was brief, BLDG
Speaker 1: Man and gerniegi a forwarding address. Thanks for sorting the plans,
Speaker 1: I replied, but done. I'll be back Thursday to pick
Speaker 1: up the last box. It was pure function, no emotion,
Speaker 1: no longing, just the close circuit of two people detaching
Speaker 1: themselves with mutual professionalism. The separation echoed out from both
Speaker 1: of us. Morgan updated her phone wallpaper, clearing out old
Speaker 1: group photo as that included Lina. Her friends. Ever practical,
Speaker 1: quietly replaced plans. Lina had once been part of my
Speaker 1: family learned the news in three sentence summaries. Lina too
Speaker 1: reported only a split after a tough yar no drama
Speaker 1: spill passed our respective circles. I couldn't decide if that
Speaker 1: was a mercy or another kind of erasure. By Thursday,
Speaker 1: the apartment looked almost untouched. Lina's things had shifted into
Speaker 1: cleano stacks, countertops cleared her half of the closet, ghostly
Speaker 1: in its emptiness. She greeted me at the door with
Speaker 1: a tired nod, no preamble, no lingering stare. I sawed
Speaker 1: through what was left, a spare poone charger, a folder
Speaker 1: of tac forms, a half empty bottle of cologne. Our
Speaker 1: wedding photo was gone from the bukshelf. In its place
Speaker 1: a blank space, as if the frame itself couldn't bear
Speaker 1: to remember. We moved in silence, only the shufflings of
Speaker 1: cardboard and the faint rhythm of Lina's playlist, one I
Speaker 1: recognized now as a regular in Jason's social feeds. It
Speaker 1: stung absurdly that he had invaded even this neutral ground.
Speaker 1: I packed without comment. While I knelt beside the bookshelf,
Speaker 1: Lena folded a blanket at the end of the couch,
Speaker 1: pausing to stare at the fabric between her hands. Have
Speaker 1: you told your parents that, she asked softly. Yeah, they're
Speaker 1: not surprised. I think everyone's all the distance. I swallowed,
Speaker 1: and you, she nodded, dark hair falling over her face.
Speaker 1: My mom already booked therapy. Dad just asked if I
Speaker 1: wanted to come stay. I don't know. An interval passed,
Speaker 1: heavy and uneven. She sat down, looking as spent as
Speaker 1: I felt. I never wanted any of this, Alex, you
Speaker 1: know that right. I said nothing, but my silence didn't
Speaker 1: carry blame. I believe her, in all its useless complexity.
Speaker 1: Wanting wasn't the pointer any more. She pulled her knees
Speaker 1: to her chest, brittle but not defensive. I thought chasing
Speaker 1: something new would fix everything. Being outdoors made me feel
Speaker 1: like I was finally breathing after drowning for so long.
Speaker 1: I didn't know how to stop at once. It started
Speaker 1: to keep work. In desire and guilt from getting all
Speaker 1: tangled up, I pressed a book into the box, taping
Speaker 1: it shut. I wasn't enough for you to want to
Speaker 1: say that startled her. She looked at me, tears rooming
Speaker 1: her lower eyelids. Alex, I love you. I still do
Speaker 1: some days, but I love being more than I was
Speaker 1: with you. For just a little while, she exhaled shakily.
Speaker 1: None of excuses anything. I just I can't fix it now.
Speaker 1: I forced my voice to stay even He shows the
Speaker 1: thing that let you run away from yourself, then from us,
Speaker 1: She nodded, defeated. We stood exhaustion, settling in the folds
Speaker 1: of our clothing for its read from striving harder truths
Speaker 1: When I finished boxing the lust of my things, I
Speaker 1: moved toward the door, back slung over my shoulder. Lena followed,
Speaker 1: hovering at the threshold one last time. I hope Morgan
Speaker 1: takes good care of you, I almost smiled. She already does,
Speaker 1: But I have to do the rest of the work myself.
Speaker 1: It felt as though a decision hung an air. Should
Speaker 1: we hug apologize for the thousand little winds neither of
Speaker 1: us had named. Instead, we both stepped aside, letting the
Speaker 1: silence be answered enough. I placed the last box in
Speaker 1: the hole. Lina lingered, insighed, hand pressed flat against the dufraim,
Speaker 1: her body half concealed. You will make some unlucky one day,
Speaker 1: the old phrase, so ringed with cochet, felt absurd in
Speaker 1: the space now between us. I shook my head, the
Speaker 1: cell more sad than better. Let's just wish each other well.
Speaker 1: She nodded, swallowing whatever last words pressed against her throat,
Speaker 1: and stepped back. Her gaze was steady, grieving, yes, but
Speaker 1: not unkind. With my arms full and pockets empty, I
Speaker 1: pulled the door, closed, the latch impossibly final, the apartment
Speaker 1: behind it already vanishing into memory. As they stepped out
Speaker 1: into the corridor. Outside, the air had shifted. The oppressive
Speaker 1: rain finally passed, leaving the city humid and overly bright.
Speaker 1: My taxi was waiting when Morgan had promised. As I
Speaker 1: slid inside, the driver gave me a nod, asking only
Speaker 1: for my dress, not my history. I set my boxes
Speaker 1: next to me, my hands unsteady but unclenched, the last
Speaker 1: fragments of our life together, secured and finished. The car
Speaker 1: moved forward, engine quiet, the street lights blurring as we
Speaker 1: turned the first corner, away from everything I had called home.
Speaker 1: For a brief, fleeting second, I pictured lean inside, sitting
Speaker 1: on the bare floor, sudden leaking through the windows, and
Speaker 1: more but free of Liza. At last, I let that
Speaker 1: image pass. I didn't need it any more. It was over.
Speaker 1: No more questions left to ask, no more truce to
Speaker 1: chase down, no stories to rearate. On the other side
Speaker 1: of Rupshire, I found only the beginning of quiet, and
Speaker 1: the knowledge that from here whatever was next would be
Speaker 1: mine alone.