Speaker 1: Photos on my phone should have made me happy. I'd
Speaker 1: gotten some beautiful shots the night before, wineglasses clinking, Tasha
Speaker 1: doubled over from some silent shrades, Clark Jeremy in one
Speaker 1: of his horrible novelty shirts, Rachel with her arm flung
Speaker 1: a round brandt cheeks flushed, all of us pressed together
Speaker 1: over the settlers of cat and bought. It was one
Speaker 1: of those easy, chaotic knights that always reminded me why
Speaker 1: we work so hard of friendships despite our busy schedules.
Speaker 1: It's why we host, Why Matt holds up an extra
Speaker 1: folding table from the garage, Why I cut up four
Speaker 1: kinds of cheese and no Jeremy hate Patasha loves. I
Speaker 1: was standing at the kitchen island, scrolling through the roll draft,
Speaker 1: posting again and again to find the shot that best
Speaker 1: captured the mood from the start of the evening, Rachel
Speaker 1: making the mocking kissy face behind Matt amir as we
Speaker 1: split a beer, or maybe the messy when down feeling.
Speaker 1: Two hours later, all of us blee with cubs and
Speaker 1: laughing over some dummim. I don't always overthink it, but
Speaker 1: we have a joint Instagram, the kind that started as
Speaker 1: a joke for the parents and the grandparents of but
Speaker 1: became our informal record. Matt loves the captions, the inside jokes.
Speaker 1: Only people like Rachel bring decode. Except tonight I felt
Speaker 1: him at my shoulder, more present than I back to it,
Speaker 1: a hand occasionally settling and not comfortingly on my back
Speaker 1: as I flicked past another shot. Usually Matt simpletest the
Speaker 1: goofy veto I look like I'm it's knees live or
Speaker 1: you can litterally see my bitter nail crop it. Tonight,
Speaker 1: when I stopped on one where Rachel and Matt happened
Speaker 1: to be next to each other across the table, both
Speaker 1: mid laugh mass response was instant. Not that one. He said,
Speaker 1: Why that's a great face, oucheeze, nudging his hip with mine.
Speaker 1: Matt's smile didn't move past his lips. It's two clutter.
Speaker 1: We look like a frat house. That's kind of the point,
Speaker 1: I said, but he was already moving behind me, using
Speaker 1: his index finger to quickly swipe past a series of photos,
Speaker 1: as if searching for something else. Entirely. I landed on
Speaker 1: another this here in the background, but he cut me off. No,
Speaker 1: none were Rachel's making that face. She'll flame me in
Speaker 1: the group chat. A lie, but a harmless enough one,
Speaker 1: or so I thought. Mike got twitched in that mild,
Speaker 1: indistinct way does Whey bump against a partner's boundary You
Speaker 1: don't understand yet. It felt silly, even a little childish.
Speaker 1: Why did he care so much about group shots right now?
Speaker 1: Last year, he'd have begged from Morr or at least
Speaker 1: slipped in a mien before I pressed post, getting camerushy
Speaker 1: on mean now Marthy's I caught my head, softening the
Speaker 1: custion with a smile. He ruffled his hair, not meeting
Speaker 1: my eyes. Not everything belongs online, I just so I
Speaker 1: don't need it every night out there forever, you know.
Speaker 1: The slight edge in his tone was new, sure, but
Speaker 1: it's not like any one I started, but he was
Speaker 1: already reaching for his phone, mumping something about work emails
Speaker 1: piling up. By the time I pressed chef on a
Speaker 1: sanitized grid of group shots with mats strategically off to
Speaker 1: one side, Rachel barely visible. It was raining against the
Speaker 1: kitchen window and steady unbroken sheets. Mass sat on the
Speaker 1: far end of the couch, scrolling answering messages with quick
Speaker 1: little taps, entirely absorbed in another world. He didn't offer
Speaker 1: to help with dishes, didn't joke about the born cheese,
Speaker 1: didn't even play DJ from his party mix. He always
Speaker 1: insisted superior to mine. Round ten he stood, stretching his
Speaker 1: arms too wide, almost theatrically. I'm white, he said, offering
Speaker 1: me a perfunctory smile. Let's crash early. He kissed my cheek,
Speaker 1: lingering for a second, then slip down the hall. I
Speaker 1: listened to the bathroom fans start up, then die away,
Speaker 1: the sound of his toothbrish rattling in its holder. I
Speaker 1: sat alone at the kitchen counter, pinching my phone between
Speaker 1: thumb and forefinger, feeling both indulgent and a little silly
Speaker 1: for her. Visiting the rejected photos, a couple of them
Speaker 1: in retrospect court, Rachel looking directly at Matt with an
Speaker 1: expression I couldn't pass half serious, half amused. Or maybe
Speaker 1: I was reading into it. Maybe I always read too
Speaker 1: much into people. I scrolled back to our earliest posts,
Speaker 1: seeing years of us Costa Rica with Brent and Tasher,
Speaker 1: Christmas at Jeremy's parents, and saying three story house, New
Speaker 1: Year's where we somehow trashed two champagne foots to the
Speaker 1: base for a flicker of a second. I imagine Matt's
Speaker 1: face in those photos blowing out as if he had
Speaker 1: never been there at all. But I shook it off.
Speaker 1: I was tired and he was tired, and we cultivated
Speaker 1: this life where nothing truly bad could bloom. Mata and
Speaker 1: I met a party neither of us wanted to attend.
Speaker 1: I remembered the warm glove of cheap bulbs strung up
Speaker 1: over someone's were sloop roof deck, and the feel of
Speaker 1: gritty dust underfoot. I was two years out of a
Speaker 1: self destructive engagement, and he'd gotten out of something messer,
Speaker 1: a three year on again slash off against spiral that
Speaker 1: had chipped away at his confidence. Yet when I found
Speaker 1: myself next to him near the drink's table, he made
Speaker 1: me forget all the boring, careful scripts. He was silly
Speaker 1: and shameless, able to cut through pretentious conversations with this
Speaker 1: off handed wit. I immediately found her resistible. I was
Speaker 1: the friend who planned the weekend, remembered birthdays, and nursed
Speaker 1: people through break ups. He was the friend you could
Speaker 1: call at midnight for a drink or adventure. That first night,
Speaker 1: we broke away from the crowd and spent in our
Speaker 1: trading the worst stories about past eight so our biggest
Speaker 1: fears are dumbest career leaders. It was easy, a kind
Speaker 1: of conversational chemistry most people only get on best days,
Speaker 1: not first ones. We didn't even exchange numbers. He found
Speaker 1: me on linked in the next day's stock of vibes,
Speaker 1: he wrote, but the good kind then asked me to brunch,
Speaker 1: just the two of us. Within three months, we'd been
Speaker 1: to six concerts, two music festivals, and countless parties where
Speaker 1: people assumed we'd known each other for ages. We built
Speaker 1: our circle to get a found family in the way
Speaker 1: ambitious city people have to, because real family is scattered
Speaker 1: across different time zones and people grow up too late
Speaker 1: to start over. Tashaw was my roommate from grad school,
Speaker 1: web smart and dry humored, the person I never quite
Speaker 1: fell in love with but always relied on share Me
Speaker 1: and Brent Ma Matt's work friends, but quickly blurred into
Speaker 1: the center of our lives. Then Rachel arrived, a friend
Speaker 1: of Brent's from a failed start up who became my
Speaker 1: best tex comford On and mass fierce, trivial, be see rival.
Speaker 1: Our weekends clustered around Potluck's fantasy football hikes at odd hours.
Speaker 1: Every relationship in our group mattered, Ever inside joke felt
Speaker 1: owned by all of us. Matt and I always joked
Speaker 1: that our marriage relied as much on our friend empire
Speaker 1: as it did on us. The foundation was trusted, but
Speaker 1: layered with a share bruising. We'd both been cheated on
Speaker 1: before my exit, a pattern of loving friendships that blow
Speaker 1: in boundaries, and Matt's previous partner had an affair with
Speaker 1: someone from yoga on our fourth date. We both have laughed.
Speaker 1: No more secrets, ever, as if by promising aid we'd
Speaker 1: build immunity for a long time, that seemed to be enough.
Speaker 1: A year ago, when we bought the condorous, brawling second
Speaker 1: floor unit above the River Walk, with space for friendsans
Speaker 1: and the kitchen big enough for my baking and that's
Speaker 1: a very serious grilling competitions, I felt more grown up
Speaker 1: than I ever expected. The signing was a high point,
Speaker 1: not because of the property, but because it was together
Speaker 1: money combined with the kind of trusty reserve for only
Speaker 1: two or three people in your life. We hosted our
Speaker 1: first Thanks given there and were upoll any, proud of
Speaker 1: every little shelf we assembled, Our lives syncopated in daily routines. Mornings,
Speaker 1: I made coffee, Matt's jam was eggs and a cod
Speaker 1: or toast. When we worked from home, he'd sneak up
Speaker 1: behind my laptop for a hug, calling me the boss.
Speaker 1: We'd made a sport of planning holidays, flipping the logic
Speaker 1: each year. Sometimes we traveled just the two of us,
Speaker 1: a road trip to Portland, hiking and ashell. Sometimes we'd
Speaker 1: all pile into our lodge Reatasha, Brent, and whoever's partner
Speaker 1: could get time off. Last year, we'd even gone as
Speaker 1: far as inviting Rachel's new boyfriend, who blended in instantly.
Speaker 1: Matt's sometimes craved adoration. It's not a judgment, just an observation.
Speaker 1: He delighted in winning people, over seeing his stories become
Speaker 1: the main event of for dinner. Sometimes it was wonderful.
Speaker 1: Sometimes it left me quietly rolling my eyes behind his back,
Speaker 1: especially when he'd fish for comp claments after a low
Speaker 1: stake success at work. He hated being micromanaged in his department,
Speaker 1: and his boss's hands on styles sometimes left him stress
Speaker 1: for days. But whatever gaps we had, our partnership had
Speaker 1: learned to patch over. We never said this is forever,
Speaker 1: because forever was scary a jinx, but we functioned as
Speaker 1: if it was a default, something permanent unless proven otherwise.
Speaker 1: Our friend group amplified us a safe enclosure that seemed
Speaker 1: to mean to the sort of portrayal that ruined other dynamics.
Speaker 1: Maybe that's why when Matt proposed skipping our annual holiday getaway,
Speaker 1: it landed in my stomach like a dropstone. It was
Speaker 1: just after breakfast on a windy, overcast Thursday, the week
Speaker 1: after game night. I'd been making notes for our Tripusially,
Speaker 1: this was the most fun kind of low key planning research,
Speaker 1: a hiking trail, trade yup reviews for the best capin text,
Speaker 1: the group with enticing photos. Matt startled me by lingering
Speaker 1: at the kitchen table, not even looking up from his
Speaker 1: laptop when he spoke, I can't do the lake House
Speaker 1: this year, he said. I glanced up. What why my
Speaker 1: boss stumped this leadership training thing on me last minute Vancouver.
Speaker 1: He didn't look at me when he said I did.
Speaker 1: His voice was clapped, a kind he uses when he's
Speaker 1: already decided that's our weak Matt, I sat trying to
Speaker 1: keep it light. The only one Tasha could get off
Speaker 1: the group. Will can't be helped, he interrupted, frowning at
Speaker 1: his screen. It's not optional, I witted for him to
Speaker 1: meet my eyes, for the share frustration, the indulgent less
Speaker 1: See if I can rearrange, But he just huffed, slamming
Speaker 1: his laptop closed. Sorry, okay, it's work, okay, I said,
Speaker 1: feeling childish for the prickling at my eyes. But the timing.
Speaker 1: He gave a half smile, one thin like he was
Speaker 1: sorry for me, not with me. Are you seriously mad?
Speaker 1: And suddenly I wasn't sure. Was I mad or just
Speaker 1: protective of our tradition? Maybe both? No, I said, too quickly,
Speaker 1: of course not. I know work's been trash. He stood,
Speaker 1: dropping his mug in the sink with a bit too
Speaker 1: much force. It's fine, you guys, go, I'll just miss
Speaker 1: one year. I tried to regroup as he disappeared down
Speaker 1: the hallway, the plunk of his shoes marking each step.
Speaker 1: When was the last time he blew off something like
Speaker 1: this without a fight? That week, he started locking his phone,
Speaker 1: something new for him. The case snap shut with a satisfying,
Speaker 1: inaugurable click. He'd always left it out during dinner, even
Speaker 1: at game nights, ignoring notifications, but now he began turning
Speaker 1: it face down, always a hand resting next to it,
Speaker 1: as if waiting for a call he didn't want me
Speaker 1: to see. The following Friday rolled around another game night,
Speaker 1: this time at Tasha's. Normally, Matt would be the first
Speaker 1: to volunteer as driver or bring extra beer, Always the
Speaker 1: energy glow in the group, he didn't bother with excuses.
Speaker 1: This time, he barely finished his first drink, citing exhaustion,
Speaker 1: then left before dessert with a distracted Early day tomorrow,
Speaker 1: I stayed late helping Tasher with dishes, trying not to
Speaker 1: look at my phone every five minutes. When Jeremy asked
Speaker 1: when Matt had gone, in that foe concerned voice only
Speaker 1: friends can get away with, I just shruped. Workhout, I said,
Speaker 1: and Tasha's eyes met mine, worried but silent. I reaped
Speaker 1: a dear earla conversation about the trip. It wasn't like
Speaker 1: Matt to bow out, especially not from something he'd been
Speaker 1: clamoring to organized for months. Part of me wanted to prad,
Speaker 1: to remind him of a promise. If you ever need out,
Speaker 1: just say so, don't let me plan around, I'll lie.
Speaker 1: But instead I cuddled up with my own disappointment, convincing
Speaker 1: myself this was normal stress, deadline, nothing sinister. Still, when
Speaker 1: I crawled into bed and Matt pretended to be asleep,
Speaker 1: his foam blinking under his pillow, it was impossible not
Speaker 1: to wonder if there was something else beneath the surface.
Speaker 1: A few nuts later, while I was watcher a run
Speaker 1: in the den, Tasha texted me, has Mat ghosted everyone's memes?
Speaker 1: Or am I the new Pariah? I grinned before I
Speaker 1: remembered Matt had in fact gone quiet in the group chat.
Speaker 1: Usually he'd be the quickest to respond to Brent's mean
Speaker 1: barrage or make fun of Jeremy's dad jokes. But crowling
Speaker 1: through the messages, I found nothing from Matt for the
Speaker 1: past two weeks work. So I started typing back, then stopped.
Speaker 1: Why was I defending him? Instead? I just said he's fried,
Speaker 1: I'll nudge him. But when I found him in our
Speaker 1: kitchen later, he was half way out the door for
Speaker 1: an emergency at work. I didn't even have time to ask.
Speaker 1: That night, while unloading the dishwasher, a nullification, pined on
Speaker 1: my phone, a crowded card alert. Never Mind that Matt
Speaker 1: and I had always kept a running to have for
Speaker 1: big expenses, even splitting things as mineer's birthday dinners. This
Speaker 1: is different at two hundred twelve dollars dinner Fritzi's than
Speaker 1: optcale spot across town, one we'd only gone to once
Speaker 1: for our anniversary. The charge was time stumped for last Wednesday,
Speaker 1: one of those I have to stay late at the office.
Speaker 1: Its budget season nights. My heart thouted, louder than I
Speaker 1: like to admit. It could be a new kleinschmooz. Matt
Speaker 1: sometimes talked about networking over prefix with venders. Still something
Speaker 1: nudged at my sense of normal. I brought it up
Speaker 1: the next night, half laughing, careful to make it sound
Speaker 1: like curiosity rather than accusation. Big spend of Fritzies is
Speaker 1: a splurge for a week night, I said, feigning a
Speaker 1: grin as I pushed his water glass toward him at dinner.
Speaker 1: He barely blinked, Oh yeah, client dinner ted from Seattle,
Speaker 1: boring as hell. He was forty five minutes late then
Speaker 1: anyone else from routine. Matt shook his head picking absolenttely
Speaker 1: at his salad. Not just me and Ted. Sometimes I
Speaker 1: hate being that guy. I let it drop before I
Speaker 1: could seem needy. The old part of me, the one
Speaker 1: that remembered mix'st slow salive from ordinary lies into the unspeakable,
Speaker 1: started to worry. Maybe this was nothing, but maybe he
Speaker 1: pulled away more. In the days there followed, turned down
Speaker 1: Tash's invitation to trivia night, skipped hiking with Jeremy and Brand,
Speaker 1: came home late, and vanished into our office with only
Speaker 1: a quick I'm behind on email. When Rachel messaged to
Speaker 1: offer and prompty brunch. The kind mat always jumped at
Speaker 1: Hi ansid alone, making out a migrants again excuse for
Speaker 1: him in public, his affection felt muted. No more posts
Speaker 1: wore hugs at the door. The playful jabs about my
Speaker 1: coffee addiction faded. If he caught me watching him, he'd
Speaker 1: look away second too fast. Rachel's messages got word too.
Speaker 1: We'd always had an easy banter. She takes to mimemes
Speaker 1: about office hell, lunch photos, links to cool events, but
Speaker 1: recently her tone felt studied, like she was pulling back.
Speaker 1: Once I even sends to pause in her responses. After
Speaker 1: I mentioned Matt. One rainy afternoon, I tagged Matt in
Speaker 1: a throwback table photo from a trip LUs spring ours pass.
Speaker 1: No notification, I checked again, confused he'd always automatically appear
Speaker 1: in our shared account's tag media. Then I saw it.
Speaker 1: Privacy settings changed. You now have to prove posts you
Speaker 1: were tagged in the app, cheerfully told me. When I
Speaker 1: asked Matt about it that night, appointed, Hey, did you
Speaker 1: get the photo tack? He shrugged, yeh saw it. Just
Speaker 1: don't need my team seeing me drunk off Seltzer get
Speaker 1: a stock screening stuff. Liability these days, babe. I tried
Speaker 1: to laugh, but it sounded strange even to me. Since
Speaker 1: when was Matt worried about liability From our friends? The
Speaker 1: group's Instagram chats were always inside jokes, barely decipherable by strangers. Later,
Speaker 1: as I cleaned up after dinner, I've heard Matt talking
Speaker 1: from our bedroom. His voice low edges of tension threading
Speaker 1: through as he murmured, no, it's fine, I'll text you,
Speaker 1: don't worry. I have to go now. When I entered,
Speaker 1: he jumped his phone under a pile of laundry, offering
Speaker 1: me a sheepish look. I raised an eyebrow lake conference
Speaker 1: call work bullshit, he muttered, just venting there being impossible
Speaker 1: this quarter. I'm sick of it, he sounded tired, not
Speaker 1: lying necessarily, but I'm willing to offer more. After he
Speaker 1: disappeared into the bathroom, I wandered into his office match
Speaker 1: Jim Baggs sat open on the floor, reaching for it,
Speaker 1: with half a mind to throw his shorts in the wash.
Speaker 1: I fished out a thin receipt tuck extra stick of deudren,
Speaker 1: not from the gem, but from the recovery spar date
Speaker 1: the exact night he'd said he was working overtime. I
Speaker 1: almost laughed. It seemed absurd. Matt was allergic to spaw
Speaker 1: music and always complained that massages made him feel like cattle.
Speaker 1: Why would he go alonem while telling me he was
Speaker 1: knee deep in spreadsheets. His birth day approached normally a
Speaker 1: three day affair, me baking, the group, inventing elaborate drinking games,
Speaker 1: Matt reveling in attention. This year, he barely acknowledged it,
Speaker 1: brushing off my hints about a friend gathering until I
Speaker 1: gave up on the day itself. He left after a
Speaker 1: quick breakfast, saying bartrup with a few work people, nothing bake,
Speaker 1: don't wait up. By midnight, I was still awake, anxious
Speaker 1: and angry, and ashamed to admit how much it all hurt.
Speaker 1: I tried to lose myself in work emails, but everything
Speaker 1: made my heart race. For the next week, I watched
Speaker 1: for clues and found them that reassured me. Tash his
Speaker 1: worried check ins, Rachel's careful texts, mat going out late,
Speaker 1: coming home, careful not to rush too close, always with
Speaker 1: an explanation that sounded just reasonable enough. Yet I kept
Speaker 1: telling myself, you're paranoid. This is how good relationships to solve.
Speaker 1: Someone over reacts, makes a scene, accuses without proof. We
Speaker 1: weren't like that. We promised transparency, and Matt was too
Speaker 1: proud to sneak around, wasn't he? Maybe I told myself
Speaker 1: he was having some kind of work crisis and just
Speaker 1: didn't want to admit it. Yet, maybe his old fear
Speaker 1: that being honest about Stroker would push me away. He
Speaker 1: had come back. I decided to say something, not a fight,
Speaker 1: not a scene, and just honest, are you okay? It
Speaker 1: feels like you are not talking. One evening after another
Speaker 1: silent dinner and a half heart attempt at Netflix. I
Speaker 1: shut the TV off and turned to him. Matt, are
Speaker 1: we or are you okay? I feel like you're somewhere
Speaker 1: else lately? Is there something happening at work or with us?
Speaker 1: He looked at me for the first time in weeks,
Speaker 1: really looked. His shoulders listened just a hair. I'm sorry.
Speaker 1: I know I've been off. It is work. They're talking laoffs.
Speaker 1: I haven't wanted to dump it on you, I've been
Speaker 1: saying late, trying to prove myself, maybe stupidly. I didn't
Speaker 1: want you to worry. Relief washed over me, but it
Speaker 1: didn't quite settle. You know you can, He stopped me,
Speaker 1: setting his hand on mine. I should have said something sooner.
Speaker 1: I just I was afraid if I told you you'd
Speaker 1: get anxious, and you've been killing it at work lately.
Speaker 1: I didn't want to drag you down. I squeeze his hand.
Speaker 1: You're allowed to have a bad month, Matt. He nodded,
Speaker 1: looking almost grateful. Promise not hiding anything else. If I
Speaker 1: get through this stupid week, I'll make it up to
Speaker 1: you and the group will do a big game night
Speaker 1: or whatever you want. The next morning, Mac kiss me
Speaker 1: goodbye with more warmth than I felt in weeks. He
Speaker 1: texted me three times that day, means updates, fun message
Speaker 1: about stopping for dinner on the way home. For a
Speaker 1: couple of days, it felt like a recept button had
Speaker 1: been pressed. I floated light with relief. Maybe I'd been
Speaker 1: too quick to assume the worst. Late one night, he
Speaker 1: even cracked a joke about us surviving my annual birthday grump.
Speaker 1: For one radiant moment, things felt more normal than they
Speaker 1: have for months. Then, in the middle of a breezy,
Speaker 1: harmless Monday, Rachel texted a question so odd to snap
Speaker 1: the illusion clean into Hey. She wrote, I hope I
Speaker 1: didn't make things worried between you and Matt. I feel
Speaker 1: like I did, and I'm really sorry if I overstepped.
Speaker 1: Just wanted you to know I've backed off. There was
Speaker 1: no context, no follow up, just a bubble left hanning confused.
Speaker 1: I messaged back, Ye didn't, not that I know. Did
Speaker 1: something happen? Her answer was so quick and cryptic it
Speaker 1: hurt nothing. Just good to check in. I care about you. Oh.
Speaker 1: I stared at her words, mind racing through the last month.
Speaker 1: Had something happened between Matt and Rachel and I had
Speaker 1: missed it completely. What could she possibly have to apologize for?
Speaker 1: Why would she feel like she overstepped? I took a breath,
Speaker 1: steadying myself. Was this about something at the last game night,
Speaker 1: one of those fleeting private jokes or fights that never
Speaker 1: lasted the night? Was something bigger? A rational voice inside
Speaker 1: me insisted I was overreacting, but another part kept paying back,
Speaker 1: connecting dots that never quite made a line. Mass mood
Speaker 1: had lightened, but with Rachel's strange text, anxiety bust at
Speaker 1: the back of my skull. I'd been so sure that
Speaker 1: with his apology would nevigate it out of stormy waters.
Speaker 1: Now I couldn't be sure of anything. Unable to sleep,
Speaker 1: A flip through mass Google calendar, more out of desperation
Speaker 1: than strategy. Most of his appointments were marked private, but
Speaker 1: one caught my eye, an entry simply titled personal on
Speaker 1: the same day as the SPA receipt I had found,
Speaker 1: but the event itself had been deleted, a hole left
Speaker 1: in the record. I clicked through, hoping for something astray
Speaker 1: a line and us click anything, but found only an
Speaker 1: empty window. Tension twisted my insides. I tried to rationalize.
Speaker 1: People delete reminders all the time. Still, it was odd
Speaker 1: in context, especially given his avoidance of the subject. For
Speaker 1: the first time in years, I sifted through our joint
Speaker 1: and individual checking accounts, tracing purchases by date. It just
Speaker 1: to balance the books, I told myself, but I knew
Speaker 1: I was lying. Within fifteen minutes, I had a list
Speaker 1: of small restaurant charges and retail purchases that didn't match
Speaker 1: anything he told me about, most nothing I'd seen him
Speaker 1: where I'll mention the biggest shark a hotel charge at
Speaker 1: the river Front Inn, a luxury spot downtown again on
Speaker 1: a night he said he was missing dinner to finish
Speaker 1: a budget free. My hand shook. I texted Tasha, feigning casual, Hey,
Speaker 1: did you hear what went down of Rachel and Maat?
Speaker 1: She sent me the weirdest apology. I included smiling emoji
Speaker 1: to soften the implication. Tasha responded, not really, mat'spin off
Speaker 1: with all of us if you hear something spill So
Speaker 1: nothing of urt, just a cloud hanging over the group.
Speaker 1: I debated talking to Jeremy o' brent, but the idea
Speaker 1: felt desperate, like breaking the rules of mutual discretion, our
Speaker 1: friendships thrived on instead, A quietly resolved to monitor, to
Speaker 1: control what I could before accusations tore a pat the
Speaker 1: whip of relationships built over years. That week, I working
Speaker 1: lunch near Matt's office. Unexpectedly swinging by to drop off
Speaker 1: a coffee. I caught him at the building entrance, clad
Speaker 1: naught in workword but jeans and a leather jacket I
Speaker 1: hadn't seen before. Walking next to him was a woman, tall, striking,
Speaker 1: laughing at something he said. I recognized her vaguely from
Speaker 1: a company photo, one of the new hires he'd mentioned
Speaker 1: only in passing. Our eyes met. His expression flickered a
Speaker 1: guilt surprise, are just annoint at being ambush? I couldn't
Speaker 1: tell liv what are you doing here? His voice was
Speaker 1: too upbeat. Forced needed to get out, I offered, holding
Speaker 1: out the cup. He took the coffee, but didn't introduce
Speaker 1: me to the woman. Instead, he shifted uncomfortably and said,
Speaker 1: this is Sadie. Knew on my team. We were just
Speaker 1: grabbing lunch. Sadie smiled professional but withdrawn Nice to meet you.
Speaker 1: I've heard so much. I smiled back, trying not to
Speaker 1: overplay any reaction. Welcome to Chicago, Matt, can you spare
Speaker 1: a minute? Sadie excused herself, and when she was gone,
Speaker 1: I asked, this morning, you said you had a heads
Speaker 1: down day at your desk. He shrugged. We were talking
Speaker 1: for project stuff. Not all were cappins in a spreadsheet live.
Speaker 1: He sounded defensive. I dropped the subject before it became
Speaker 1: a scene. That night, Rachel called her voice brutal. Do
Speaker 1: you have a minute? Sure? Everything okay? She hesitated. I
Speaker 1: just so, I feel like Matt's upset with me. Did
Speaker 1: he say anything? The question rang out guilt or innocence.
Speaker 1: I couldn't gage, not really. Why did ye guys argue?
Speaker 1: She exhaled a shaky sound. I guess I got on
Speaker 1: his nerves. He asked for space. I thought maybe I overstepped.
Speaker 1: Maybe it's work stuff. Sorry, dune to ask. It's not dumb,
Speaker 1: I showed her. But an ocean seemed to have opened
Speaker 1: between us. Rachel, who was always brash and opinionated, now
Speaker 1: sounded small, like sheibinedged from a party she once owned.
Speaker 1: After our call a coal brand under the guise of
Speaker 1: for just catching up, trying to read the timber of
Speaker 1: his voice for anything unusual. I tried to keep things light,
Speaker 1: but when I circled the talk back toward Matt and suggested,
Speaker 1: he seemed off, bren hesitated. He's been different, I guess, quiet,
Speaker 1: maybe taught to Rachel, He said, as if he'd rehearse
Speaker 1: the answer already, then changing the subject. You want to
Speaker 1: come hiking Saturday if the weather holt. I agreed, but
Speaker 1: the invitation felt like a smokescreen. Sleep eluded me that night.
Speaker 1: I lay awake in our two big bed, hyperaware of
Speaker 1: every move Matt made his half wakeful snoring, the way
Speaker 1: he ankled his body away from mine, the sharp breath
Speaker 1: when his phone lit up at midnight. I thought about
Speaker 1: our promises from early in a relationship, about how his
Speaker 1: body used to curl naturally toward mine, how I used
Speaker 1: to trust him with her question. One morning, before Matt
Speaker 1: left for work, I found his gym back sitting open
Speaker 1: in the hallway. Again, heart pounding, I rummiged until I
Speaker 1: found another receipt, of this time for a retail clothings
Speaker 1: same date as the hotel charge, a time when he
Speaker 1: claimed to be at a department all set the purchase
Speaker 1: one dress not his size, with no gift rap Was
Speaker 1: it possible he'd gotten something for me and forgotten to
Speaker 1: mention it. Maybe, but the rational part of me doubted it.
Speaker 1: I'd been in his work bag enough times to know
Speaker 1: he never kept forgotten gifts. I reached a point where
Speaker 1: the evidence, the scattered receipts, deleted calender invites, muted anxiety
Speaker 1: and our friend's felt overwhelming, and yet Ma acted like
Speaker 1: nothing had changed. He'd offer a little gestures's coffee ahusier day,
Speaker 1: but they felt performative, as if he'd rehearsed from a
Speaker 1: script he'd lost the plot for. At dinner the next night,
Speaker 1: he made a show of reading texts, setting his phone
Speaker 1: face down as if to meet me halfway. His attempt
Speaker 1: to smile was all surface. I got your treat, he said,
Speaker 1: handing me a pastry from a new bakery I'd mentioned.
Speaker 1: See I pay attention. The gesture landed hollow. I tried
Speaker 1: to thank him, but must have sound a distant. That night,
Speaker 1: Rachel texted me a mean we used to share on
Speaker 1: bad days, no caption, but undercurrent of longing and apology.
Speaker 1: I couldn't make sense of the web of secrecy. Matt,
Speaker 1: who had once weaponized honesty against the cruelty of his
Speaker 1: ex was suddenly unrecognizable and available, evasive hiding shadows and
Speaker 1: corners I'd never thought to check. But I wasn't ready
Speaker 1: to confront this yet, not with only fragments and surmies,
Speaker 1: not when if I was wrong, I chatter a good
Speaker 1: thing forever. Instead, I poured another glass of wine and
Speaker 1: scrawled again for old photos, the ones Matt wouldn't let
Speaker 1: me post, the ones with Rachel, the ones with a
Speaker 1: room full of laughter, unknown secrets. I couldn't help but
Speaker 1: wonder what I wasn't seeing, even though the truth had
Speaker 1: already started to twist at the edges of my life,
Speaker 1: daring me to look closer. I started to clock time
Speaker 1: by the patterns of Matt's absences. Thursday late gone before
Speaker 1: I woke. Saturday morning suddenly belonged to Erran's thow cardio,
Speaker 1: even if he came back with nothing but damp hair
Speaker 1: in the scent of soap I didn't recognize on his skin.
Speaker 1: There was a new energy vibrating off him in not
Speaker 1: the productive goofy when I had married, but a wary restlessness.
Speaker 1: He snapped as Shoelas's tight at the doors. If someone
Speaker 1: would time him and left without the usual kiss, sometimes
Speaker 1: calling a two chip or back soon over one shoulder.
Speaker 1: The rhythms we'd build for ourselves seen to fade into
Speaker 1: chalk lines. Even the silence between us gain mass, acquiring weight,
Speaker 1: so that a single casual remark tells an entire evening
Speaker 1: out of shape. I filled the extra time of work,
Speaker 1: or pretended to. Lately, my emails to clients got longer, fusser,
Speaker 1: circling the same details twice. When I did catch Matt
Speaker 1: at home, it was in fragments, him plucking in air
Speaker 1: pods before I finished a story of setting up his
Speaker 1: laptop with his back to the kitchen. Once I padded
Speaker 1: out to the living room and socks at midnight, unable
Speaker 1: to sleep, and caught him scrolling through Spotify, nodding to
Speaker 1: a playlist I didn't reckonize one on so sentimental it
Speaker 1: made me stop in the doorway. It didn't peggy for
Speaker 1: soft jazz. At one a m I joked, hoping the
Speaker 1: old banter might snap us both out of it. Couldn't sleep,
Speaker 1: kneaded back round noise, His eyes flaked away quick as
Speaker 1: a shut window. The weather stayed wet and cull, the
Speaker 1: kind that leaks into walls and under nails. Tasha texted
Speaker 1: to say she'd seen Matt's car near the Downtown Jim
Speaker 1: on her lunch break, but when she'd waved, he hadn't noticed,
Speaker 1: or hadn't wanted to. Maybe he's just swanted, she wrote,
Speaker 1: adding a harp, He'll hang soon. You okay. There was
Speaker 1: no elegant way to answer, I think, so I replied.
Speaker 1: I practiced not lying, even when I wanted to be comforted.
Speaker 1: The next Saturday, the group tried again brunch at the
Speaker 1: new spot in River North, Rachel's favor, the kind of
Speaker 1: place that always requires a reservation and thick skin for
Speaker 1: the volume in the group text. Matt didn't reply at all.
Speaker 1: Finally I offered, MAT's going to try to come late
Speaker 1: work stuff. I got there with Tasher, who surveyed the
Speaker 1: press tablecloths, narrowed her eyes, then sunk into her sipt.
Speaker 1: She waited until Brent and Jeremy took up the other
Speaker 1: end of the table before leaning in. You too good,
Speaker 1: she asked, quietly. We're fine, I said, just work for him,
Speaker 1: I think, branchhimed in loud enough for the table man,
Speaker 1: where's Matthiu's losing his mojor. Rachel smiled thinly, not meeting
Speaker 1: my eyes at first. He's probably just dodging the most
Speaker 1: math with Jeremy. The group laughed, but the Traville chatter
Speaker 1: never really took off. I washed Rachel wheel as her
Speaker 1: hair was different, a new cut, shorter, sharper at her jaw.
Speaker 1: She kept her phone faced down on the table, glancing
Speaker 1: my way only fleetingly. I tried to catch her eye,
Speaker 1: but she busied herself fussing with the little jam jars,
Speaker 1: stacking them and stacking. After a long, sticky pause, she said, hey, live,
Speaker 1: want to split pancakes? Sure haven't done that in ages.
Speaker 1: It felt like a little white flag, a peace offering
Speaker 1: whose terms I didn't understand. The pancakes came and we
Speaker 1: divided them with a practice ease, but the old rhythm
Speaker 1: was gone. Later, on my way to the bathroom, Tasha
Speaker 1: stopped me in an arrow hall. Seriously, is this about Matt,
Speaker 1: she whispered. My chest tightened just hearing his name in
Speaker 1: that context. What do you mean he's different? The joke
Speaker 1: energy's gone even in the group texts. It's like he's
Speaker 1: afraid to say the wrong thing. And Rachel's weired lately, too.
Speaker 1: I wish I knew, I said, honestly, he says it's work.
Speaker 1: She gave me a skeptical look. Do you believe him?
Speaker 1: I didn't answer. She nodded like she understood more than
Speaker 1: she wanted to. I took longer than necessary in the bathroom,
Speaker 1: pressing my palms against the cold granite, willing my face
Speaker 1: into a neutral expression. All at once. I was certain
Speaker 1: I'd be naive. There was nothing left to do but
Speaker 1: whether it, at least until something truly correct. After brunch,
Speaker 1: Rachel offered me a ride home. The inside of her
Speaker 1: car smelled like lavender and hand sanitizer. She fiddled with
Speaker 1: her phone, choosing a playless heavy on Melancholy Indy. For
Speaker 1: a minute. The silence stretched. Finally I broke it and
Speaker 1: did something happen I should know about with Matt? I mean?
Speaker 1: Her hands tightened on the wheel, knuckles pale. No, I mean,
Speaker 1: I don't think so. He's been distant with all of us,
Speaker 1: not just me, I asked, trying for lightness. No, it's
Speaker 1: not just you, she hesitated. He asked for space from me,
Speaker 1: said he needed to focus on work. I digested this,
Speaker 1: that's all. She nodded, but wouldn't meet my gaze. Her
Speaker 1: voice sounded thinner if I did anything messed up. I
Speaker 1: just want you to know I'd never miss with you two. Ever,
Speaker 1: the way she said choppy to fence and apology jumbled together,
Speaker 1: left uncomfortable ripples in my mind. I know, Rutch, I said,
Speaker 1: We're okay, right, Yeah, just wanted to say it. That night,
Speaker 1: Matt got home after midnight, shoes slick in his shirt
Speaker 1: and tucked. His excuse was more elaborate, a last minute
Speaker 1: happy hour with clients who wouldn't take no for an answer.
Speaker 1: His eyes glittered, nervous and watchful. You're up late, he said,
Speaker 1: I shrugged, folding a blanket I'd already folded three times.
Speaker 1: We missed you at brunch. He kicked off his shoes,
Speaker 1: dropped his keys, and looked through me. Yes, sorry next time,
Speaker 1: he sighed up a hug, moving past me with a
Speaker 1: careful distance, head into the shower before I could bress,
Speaker 1: going for our financis that Sunday with a spreadsheet more
Speaker 1: for comfort the necessity, I found the second hotel charge
Speaker 1: in as many weeks, this time a perfectly matched ghost
Speaker 1: of his late night with Seattle clients. I checked my
Speaker 1: own calendar for the same day. I'd been home early,
Speaker 1: thinking i'd surprise him, would take up, only to find
Speaker 1: the place dark, his phone going to voicemail. Every piece
Speaker 1: fit of patten. I wished I could break a new
Speaker 1: woman at work, stressed in a friend group Matt's create
Speaker 1: expense trail, each purchased one step further from home. That afternoon,
Speaker 1: I decided to test him. I waited until he was
Speaker 1: settled in front of the TV and flopped onto the
Speaker 1: couch next to him, latting my legs draped across his
Speaker 1: What's the best restaurant you've taken a client to this year?
Speaker 1: I asked, Tom Casual. He frowned, thinking Fritzy's I guess
Speaker 1: ted wouldn't shut up about the pork belly. I propped
Speaker 1: my chin on his shoulder. Anyone ever skip out on
Speaker 1: those and drag you some more better? He shook his head. Nah,
Speaker 1: My teen's all softies. By nine, they want to uberhome? Why?
Speaker 1: Just curious? Tasher and I were debating best steak in
Speaker 1: the city, I lied, smoothly. She thinks you've been hiding recommendations,
Speaker 1: he smiled, relaxing a shade. You know I'm basic as
Speaker 1: hell happy with tacos. I watched his profile, how quickly
Speaker 1: he accepted my story, how easily he slid into the
Speaker 1: role of weary of worked husband. I thought about the
Speaker 1: hotel charge, about the missing hours. He pressed play on
Speaker 1: the show. Let's not talk shop tonight. O K O K,
Speaker 1: I said, and tried to lean into his warmth. The
Speaker 1: next morning, I reached out du Brent. He was always
Speaker 1: slightly outside the tornado, perceptive to a fault. I texted,
Speaker 1: is Matt good haven't seen in him myself lately? He
Speaker 1: replied after an hour, He's quiet once less croupe. I
Speaker 1: think we all get burned out sometimes live. That didn't
Speaker 1: feel much like BRNN. The message read as if he'd
Speaker 1: run it, or a filter made it just blind enough.
Speaker 1: I'd stop asking. After a skull through Matt's Instagram, his
Speaker 1: personal then ow joined nothing new, nothing to hack, nothing
Speaker 1: even hinting at his comings and goings. In a tide list,
Speaker 1: photos from all trips rattled to the surface. A year ago,
Speaker 1: there would have been a dozen group brunch snaps. This year,
Speaker 1: carefully curated images, some posts quietly dropped. I realized now
Speaker 1: that half the shots of Rachel that he'd ejert about
Speaker 1: feeting was simply gone. The first week of the new month,
Speaker 1: Matt got sick, or said he did. He texted from
Speaker 1: the office, then called at four p m. To say
Speaker 1: he stated his parents in the suburbs for a knight.
Speaker 1: He didn't want to get ey sick before your pitch meeting.
Speaker 1: Oddly thoughtful, but out of character. Matt hated being sick
Speaker 1: anywhere but home, where the TV was set up just so,
Speaker 1: and I'd bring him ginger ale. He called the next night,
Speaker 1: sounding tired. I asked if he needed to pick up
Speaker 1: company seeped anything, No, he said, just need to sleep.
Speaker 1: I listened hard for background noise, chatter, street sounds that
Speaker 1: he v something to tell me if he was truly
Speaker 1: where he said he was. All I could hear was
Speaker 1: a soft static, like wind in a tunnel. I spent
Speaker 1: the night anxious, rubbing my thumb along the seam of
Speaker 1: his pillow, even knowing how pathetic it made me feel.
Speaker 1: I scrolled our group chap for any sign of life
Speaker 1: from Matt. Nothing, just the tight, cheerful messages of adults
Speaker 1: trying not to address the absence of someone central. The
Speaker 1: next day, our work overlapped, I spotted an event flier
Speaker 1: for a company wellness day. Spied massed apartment name and
Speaker 1: tiny print. I texted, how's the meditation class? He replied,
Speaker 1: missed it, stuck in meetings. But the instagram of a
Speaker 1: clan I followed showed him in the background, deep in
Speaker 1: conversation with Sadie, the new woman from the office. They
Speaker 1: looked nothing but professional. Still, I noted the rapport, the
Speaker 1: intensity of his expression, the way his body angled towards hers.
Speaker 1: I wished I could hate her, but all I felt
Speaker 1: was an ache were certainty had once been. It all
Speaker 1: felt like trying to read a novel from Tom Page,
Speaker 1: as nothing made sense unless you already knew the ending.
Speaker 1: After my next client meeting, I bought coffee for Rachel
Speaker 1: and showed up at her office unannounced. She looked surprised,
Speaker 1: but not annoyed. Coffee for your pain, I said, brandishing
Speaker 1: the cop She held the door open ushered me to
Speaker 1: a corner table, away from her coworkers. You didn't have to,
Speaker 1: but thinks I studied her. She looked tired, paler than normal,
Speaker 1: as if something was joining her. Rachel, is there something
Speaker 1: you need to tell me about Matt? I just said,
Speaker 1: it okay, if there is. She looked at her hands,
Speaker 1: then at the window, out at the rolling river below.
Speaker 1: We didn't do anything, love, I promised. If you're worried,
Speaker 1: don't be. But he has been weird. He asked me
Speaker 1: not to talk about some stuff, and I'm not supposed
Speaker 1: to get involved. It's his business, he keeps saying, his business. Howl.
Speaker 1: Another pause long enough to hurt. Just work stuff, I thought.
Speaker 1: Then I saw him at a bar with someone from work, Sadie.
Speaker 1: I think they were talking shop, but honestly it made
Speaker 1: me uncomfortable. I tried to ask him if everything's okay,
Speaker 1: but he'd barely look at me. After that, it was
Speaker 1: easier to just step back. I nodded, unsure how to
Speaker 1: place my anger. Was it about Matt and Sadie? While
Speaker 1: being made by Cinder in my own marriage? I was
Speaker 1: suddenly grateful for Rachel's candor, even as it's done. When
Speaker 1: I got home, Matt was gone again, a tax working late.
Speaker 1: Don't wait up. I sat in the condo twilight, scrolling
Speaker 1: through our finances. In you this time, I dug into
Speaker 1: the old folders of Gift's expenses, anywhere a detail might
Speaker 1: have slipped past charges toned up for tickets to exhibits.
Speaker 1: I had never attended dinners at restaurants. I hadn't heard
Speaker 1: about beauty cotel bars. I called his work voice mail,
Speaker 1: using a voice that felt safe, just checking their retreat
Speaker 1: next month. Can you confirm the dates for corporate paperwork?
Speaker 1: The receptionist attired, sounding woman I'd met a handful of times, hesitated.
Speaker 1: We actually moved that conference to January. Sorry, I think
Speaker 1: the teams are all local through the holidays. No Vancouver.
Speaker 1: I hung up my hands, sweating despite the cold. That night,
Speaker 1: Matt arrived just before midnight, reeking faintly of aftershave and
Speaker 1: expensive colonni he didn't know. He un dressed quietly in
Speaker 1: the bath room, folded his clothes over a chair, something
Speaker 1: he only did when he didn't want to weak meat,
Speaker 1: and settled into better careful three inches from my back.
Speaker 1: I lay rigid, eyes open, counting his breast until the
Speaker 1: snoring told me nothing useful at all. Everything came to
Speaker 1: a head a week later, during a brief, unexpected break
Speaker 1: in the rain, a sunny, hopeful afternoon, wholly at odds,
Speaker 1: with the growing sense of dread in my chest, I
Speaker 1: came home early hands full of groceries and spotted MAT's
Speaker 1: car parked at the curb. Inside the condo was silent
Speaker 1: but for the faint sound of music from his office.
Speaker 1: The door was cracked and I could hear his voice, low, coaxing, intimate.
Speaker 1: He said, you make this so much harder. You know,
Speaker 1: a pause then softer. I can just keep sneaking around.
Speaker 1: A laugh not tis high and familiar, muffled by distance.
Speaker 1: I set the groceries down with shaking hands. Every cell
Speaker 1: in my body told me to open the door, to
Speaker 1: demand the truth. Instead, I stood frozen behind the wall,
Speaker 1: straining to hear more. But all I caught was a
Speaker 1: scrape of a chair and the abrupt halt of conversation.
Speaker 1: When I found the strength to knock, Matt swung the
Speaker 1: door open. Instantly the phone was gone. He looked startled, angry, almost,
Speaker 1: but it flickered into force calm. Hey, who are you
Speaker 1: talking to? I asked, keeping my own voice. Daddy boj
Speaker 1: she's losing her mind with roll up, he replied, not
Speaker 1: missing a beat, not even a hint of shame, Ye said,
Speaker 1: ye be at work. I switched to remote for the afternoon,
Speaker 1: needed quite to concentrate. He held my gaze, eyes wide,
Speaker 1: almost daring me to call him out. I nodded, disguising
Speaker 1: a tremor in my voice, Dinners on the counter thanks.
Speaker 1: He brushed past me, not touching, leaving only the lingering
Speaker 1: said of that new cologne in his wake. The pieces
Speaker 1: were all there to web, so thick with lies, I
Speaker 1: could hardly breathe for the stickiness of it. And still
Speaker 1: I found myself stabling, floundering in doubt. Hadn't I always
Speaker 1: prided myself on refusing to be that jealous spouse, the
Speaker 1: one whose fear made them ugly. I wanted evidence, I
Speaker 1: wanted release, but also I wanted the story it sold
Speaker 1: myself to snap back into place Instead. The evening dissolved
Speaker 1: in the usual ways, the silent meal map fixated on
Speaker 1: his phone, me cleaning up after everything too quiet, two tents,
Speaker 1: every fork's grape blood enough to feel final. I lay
Speaker 1: in our bed that night, the matter was seemingly twice
Speaker 1: as big as before, listening to the rain return. Finally,
Speaker 1: as the condo ticked and settled around us, Matt's sleep
Speaker 1: and reachable, I whispered to the dark, tell me how
Speaker 1: we got here, and waited heart pounding for an answer
Speaker 1: that would never come from him. The rain had returned,
Speaker 1: making the city glare on the windows like thousands of
Speaker 1: restless insets. I sat in the kitchen, the groceries still
Speaker 1: in their bags on the counter, watching the red numbers
Speaker 1: on the oven cycle forward upstairs. Mass careful footsteps passed
Speaker 1: back and forth over the old floorboards, stopping above me,
Speaker 1: then moving again, like he couldn't settle, like he knew
Speaker 1: the fault line running just beneath us was about to
Speaker 1: split wide. My body thrumbed with a nervousness that felt
Speaker 1: both foreign and inevitable. Every moundane sound, mat running the shower,
Speaker 1: his phone buzzing with a strain of unknown notifications, struck
Speaker 1: me like gunfire. I unloaded the milk, set the eggs
Speaker 1: in a fridge, and tried to act as if each
Speaker 1: action might stitch things back together. I kept thinking, what now,
Speaker 1: and every answer I conjured came out twisted. When Matt
Speaker 1: finally appeared, hair wet, t shirt, clinging, eyes circled with
Speaker 1: the sustion, and I realized I didn't know which version
Speaker 1: of him I would face. For a long minute, we
Speaker 1: both pretended nothing was unusual. He pulled a beer from
Speaker 1: the fringe. I stared a pot of post on the stove.
Speaker 1: He hadn't changed plans, hadn't run, hadn't tried to smooth anything.
Speaker 1: Yet that scared me most, the nonchalance, as if denial
Speaker 1: much chieldham. He sat at the counter and looked at
Speaker 1: his hands. We should talk, he said, Finally were his
Speaker 1: blunt and flavorless. I turned off the burner. The hiss
Speaker 1: of cooling water felt like a countdown. I had the
Speaker 1: sense if I waited, he'd vanished, not physically, but as
Speaker 1: a man. I recognized. The silence ballooned out, and we
Speaker 1: both let it grow until ordinary talk became impossible. We
Speaker 1: moved through the rest of the evening like ghosts, bumping
Speaker 1: into each other, yet orbiting at deliberate distance. When the
Speaker 1: phone rang his, always his, he slipped away down the
Speaker 1: hallway foric low and careful. I stood by the front door,
Speaker 1: holding my own phone thumb, hovering through all texts with
Speaker 1: Rachel with Tash, searching for a script that might tell
Speaker 1: me what to do next, but there was nothing. I
Speaker 1: left the groceries half unpacked, the bags forming a sad
Speaker 1: barricade on the counter, and wandered to the bedroom. I
Speaker 1: sat in bed fully clothed, listening to the city, to
Speaker 1: the wind whipping rain against the window, to the faint
Speaker 1: echo of Matt on the phone. He was less careful
Speaker 1: with his words, his time, or maybe just louder, too
Speaker 1: tired to keep the performance going. Don't call me tonight,
Speaker 1: he said. It's complicated. I'll fix it. I just need space.
Speaker 1: I didn't need to hear the other side. The tone
Speaker 1: of the cadence, the words set my teeth on edge,
Speaker 1: but there was a strange comfort to something finally cracked.
Speaker 1: The script was broken, pretense was over. I felt like
Speaker 1: a bisonder at my own undoing. The next morning, there
Speaker 1: was no reprieve. Matt had left before sunrise, the faint
Speaker 1: trace of his glogn lingering in the bathroom. On the
Speaker 1: kitchen counter, I found his mouth half full on a note,
Speaker 1: just a single line back tonight, we'll talk. I didn't
Speaker 1: go to work. I called in sick, which surprised even me.
Speaker 1: I lay on the couch, not sleeping, not reading, not
Speaker 1: doing anything except letting time poole uselessly around me. It
Speaker 1: was the first time in years I didn't know what
Speaker 1: I wanted from the next hour round noon, Tasha called
Speaker 1: you ok oh ye sunned off. The warmth in her
Speaker 1: voice only made the tears come quicker. I'm not okay,
Speaker 1: I said, the words almost relieve me. I think Matt's cheating,
Speaker 1: or I know he's cheating with someone from work, with Sadie.
Speaker 1: She was quite for a long moment. Come over, she asked.
Speaker 1: I can't not yet. You don't have to explain, she said,
Speaker 1: just let us know if you want company, We love you.
Speaker 1: After I hung up, I checked my email, desperate for
Speaker 1: anything normal. There was a single email from Brent subject
Speaker 1: linery Saturday hike. The body was just here if you
Speaker 1: want to talk, no pressure. I closed the laptop, ashamed
Speaker 1: that I couldn't bring myself to reply. The hours moved,
Speaker 1: removable and pointless. My phone buzzed Rachel again, just a
Speaker 1: heart EMOGI this time. By the time evening came, the
Speaker 1: city was shimmering gray, and my mind was heavy with
Speaker 1: all the things I hadn't said. I reached for a
Speaker 1: bottle of wine, but set it back. I needed clarity,
Speaker 1: not numbness. I needed to see him light in me,
Speaker 1: not just suspect it. I needed, I realized, to choose
Speaker 1: the next step, and not just be dragged down by
Speaker 1: someone else's consequence. Mac came home later than usual, smelling
Speaker 1: of the outside a mix of rain car exhaust and
Speaker 1: unfamiliar perfume. I sat at the kitchen table, arms folded,
Speaker 1: watching the door. He hesitated in the doorway, reading the signals. Hey,
Speaker 1: he ventured too neutral. I didn't answer. He hung up
Speaker 1: his coat, moving with the awkwardness of some one out
Speaker 1: of practice at being watched. When he finally found his seat,
Speaker 1: he kept his gaze fixed on the dark ward of
Speaker 1: the table. You look like you haven't slept, I shrugged,
Speaker 1: Did you? He has hailed, resting his chin on his hand,
Speaker 1: staring at me over the rim of his knuckles. I
Speaker 1: know you want to talk here, I said, voice higher
Speaker 1: than I wanted. He straightened, chest rising and falling. O kay,
Speaker 1: ask me whatever you want. He sounded, almost defiant, like
Speaker 1: the last of his defenses were held together by sheer exhaustion.
Speaker 1: I started small because I couldn't help myself. Were you
Speaker 1: in Vancouver last month? He rubbed an eye, not even
Speaker 1: pretending confusion. No, did you have a client dinner at Fritzy's?
Speaker 1: A pause? Not with a client? No, I nodded, forcing
Speaker 1: myself to look at his face, fully, noticing new details,
Speaker 1: faint lines at the edges of his eyes, a hollow
Speaker 1: at his cheek I'd never seen before. Are you seeing
Speaker 1: some one else? He stared down at his hands, turning
Speaker 1: his wedding wing with his thumb. A nervous stick well long,
Speaker 1: stretching silence. He didn't reply. The clock took five beats.
Speaker 1: He inhaled, sharply. Yes, it felt surprisingly small after all
Speaker 1: the waiting, The admission hung between us, cold and final.
Speaker 1: Who I asked, already knowing, needing to hear him say it.
Speaker 1: He fidgeted, ran a hand through his hair. Sadie from
Speaker 1: my team? How long he wins, not meeting my eyes?
Speaker 1: Four months? Maybe more. I didn't plan it. It just happened,
Speaker 1: I'll laugh the sound sharp and strange. Things don't just happen, Matt.
Speaker 1: You have to make choices every day, over and over.
Speaker 1: He slumped, cheeks, flushing. I know I tried to stop.
Speaker 1: Every time I did. I just got in deeper. I
Speaker 1: don't know what's wrong with me. I shook my head.
Speaker 1: Maybe nothing's wrong except you thought you could get away
Speaker 1: with Lyne. He pressed his palms to his temples silent.
Speaker 1: The room swelled with the weight of every accidental memory,
Speaker 1: every joke that now felt like a lie. I pressed again,
Speaker 1: my voice trembling. Did you sleep with her? I want
Speaker 1: you to be honest. He raised his eyes to mine,
Speaker 1: rave roomed tears shining, button shed Yes, I'm sorry. A
Speaker 1: long moment passed before either of us move. He covered
Speaker 1: his face, shoulders hitching with a silent sob. I stared
Speaker 1: out the window of Foxing, on the lamp light, on
Speaker 1: the dripping rain. He tried to force words through his hands.
Speaker 1: I ended it with Rachel because she saw me slipping.
Speaker 1: I knew if I kept hanging out, i'd I don't know,
Speaker 1: get caught or make her complicit. She called me out,
Speaker 1: said I was being reckless, so I pushed her away.
Speaker 1: I blinked, trying to fit this new information into all
Speaker 1: the misconnections, the awkward brunches, Rachel's tensions. Was there anything
Speaker 1: between you and Rachel? His mouth twisted. No, never like that.
Speaker 1: She's always been your friend, more than mine, but she
Speaker 1: saw things. I think she wanted to believe there was
Speaker 1: an explanation, but I let her feel like she'd done
Speaker 1: something wrong. I'm sorry. For that too. It's not Rachel's
Speaker 1: drop to protect us, I say, voiced brittle. He nodded mutely.
Speaker 1: We sat in silence, letting the dulhum of the fridge
Speaker 1: be our background noise. The walls held our words, our failures,
Speaker 1: each one more I could than sound. Finally, I said,
Speaker 1: very softly, you need to leave to night. I can't
Speaker 1: breathe with you here. He nodded, defeated. You deserve better
Speaker 1: than this. He stood, swaying slightly, as if insure of
Speaker 1: his own legs. He started to gather things from the
Speaker 1: whole closet, an overnight back shoes or rain jacket, each
Speaker 1: sound loud in the small space. I followed him as
Speaker 1: far as the door, stopping just short of touching his
Speaker 1: back hand on the knob. He looked over his shoulder,
Speaker 1: lips pressed flat. If you if you want to talk
Speaker 1: or need anything, I'll answer, I promise, but I'll wait
Speaker 1: for you to be ready. I nodded, not trusting my voice.
Speaker 1: The door closed gently, no drama, no slam finality, just
Speaker 1: as soft toush as the latch caught. I stood in
Speaker 1: the empty hallway, hot hammering, and realized nothing would ever
Speaker 1: ring quite the same in this house again. I wandered
Speaker 1: the rooms, pausing at the smallest signs of Matt, his
Speaker 1: running shoes at the back door, his razor by the sink,
Speaker 1: a half folded shirt on our bed. I slid open
Speaker 1: the closet and took ove an old sweatshirt, pressing my
Speaker 1: face to the fabric, breathing in the scent that signified
Speaker 1: normally clean laundry, a ghost of aftershave, the gentlest hint
Speaker 1: of something gone. My stomach twisted painfully, the urge to
Speaker 1: scream I'll throw something rising and subsiding in helpless, angry waves.
Speaker 1: I messaged Tasher, he's gone. Don't ask for details, please
Speaker 1: just any time. Her reply was instant and somehow both
Speaker 1: vital and weightless and anything always. I wanted to ask
Speaker 1: for company, but the idea of being witnessed in my
Speaker 1: rawness made me cold. I wandered into the living room,
Speaker 1: sitting cross like it on the floor in front of
Speaker 1: the old album where we'd stuck polaroids from past parties.
Speaker 1: Each image flickered with a different meaning, now a troop
Speaker 1: of friend's grinning, Rachel clutching my shoulder, Mad and Mid
Speaker 1: laughed the outline of our lives as it had been.
Speaker 1: I tried to try it and failed to find a
Speaker 1: version of myself inside those scenes. Who could have guessed
Speaker 1: how easy it was to lose track of what made
Speaker 1: us real? Work was impossible. I showed up for a
Speaker 1: design meeting, Hans jittery, Mine somewhere else entirely. Everyone moved
Speaker 1: in and out of focus. Something's up with the livier,
Speaker 1: I heard someone whisper as I left before lunch. My
Speaker 1: absence is stacking up like debts. That afternoon, unable to
Speaker 1: bear the artificial cheer of the living room a my sister,
Speaker 1: I didn't say anything about Sadie, about cheating, about hotels
Speaker 1: and lies and group chat forwards. All I managed was
Speaker 1: the marriage is not okay right now, she said, the
Speaker 1: only true thing. Do whatever you need. He are not alone.
Speaker 1: Matt Tex had late that night, just a short message,
Speaker 1: Can we talk? Is there a way forward? Promise I'll
Speaker 1: be honest, Please let me know. I read the words
Speaker 1: over and over. It their tone both desperate and practiced,
Speaker 1: as if he'd sent them a dozen times already to himself.
Speaker 1: I didn't answer. It felt brave in its smallness. I
Speaker 1: sat at the dining table surrounded by the silence, staring
Speaker 1: at my phone, the empty seat beside me, the fading
Speaker 1: glow of the city's spooling out beyond our window. In
Speaker 1: every shadow, I saw the shape of a life that
Speaker 1: used to fit, and the weight of everything I'd have
Speaker 1: to untangle to find my way back to myself. On
Speaker 1: the second morning after Matt moved out, I made coffee
Speaker 1: with shaking hands and off sunlight leaking in to make
Speaker 1: the apartment feel hostile. I let the toast burn watch,
Speaker 1: but a pool in the center like an eye. The
Speaker 1: doughbell rang, Tasher dropping off soup and bread from the bakery.
Speaker 1: She gathered me up in a hug, said nothing more.
Speaker 1: I tried to thank her, but words failed. Everything I
Speaker 1: tried to say about the house, about love, about what
Speaker 1: had been lost, sounded too brittle in my throat. After
Speaker 1: she left, I took the soup to the dining table,
Speaker 1: but couldn't swallow. Food felt like an obligation meant for
Speaker 1: a different version of me. I wandered to the hallway,
Speaker 1: finding myself suddenly and irrationally angry with the frame photos
Speaker 1: fill in the wall, a time line of on us
Speaker 1: that seemed both intimate and impossibly far away. I started
Speaker 1: pulling the frames down, not smashing them, just stacking them
Speaker 1: flat on a shelf. It felt like cleaning out some
Speaker 1: one else's mess. I wanted every trace of us together,
Speaker 1: pushed into a neutral space and to the cold logic
Speaker 1: of storage. Later that day, an email landed in our
Speaker 1: seed account, a save the date for the group spring barbecue,
Speaker 1: sent by Durremy, as if nothing in the world had
Speaker 1: shifted at all. I stared at my name, paired with MAT's,
Speaker 1: light headed, with the reminder that the facade was still
Speaker 1: and tat for everyone else. Part of me wanted to
Speaker 1: reply to out the ugliness of our reality in a
Speaker 1: single group message, blow up the polite fiction, just for
Speaker 1: a second. But I closed the app. None of them
Speaker 1: deserved to become collatteral. Another message came in, this one
Speaker 1: from Rachel. Oh, I'm sorry for everything, truly. I hope
Speaker 1: you know that nothing was ever about you. There was
Speaker 1: hurt in every syllable. I sat for a long time,
Speaker 1: composing and deleting possible replies, all of them falling short.
Speaker 1: In the end, I just sent back, thank you, We're okay.
Speaker 1: It felt like an ending. At dusk, I paced the
Speaker 1: length of the condo, the ruins were hushed. I galloed
Speaker 1: what remained of Matt's things, a shaven kit, a tanngle
Speaker 1: of laptop cords, a drawer full of socks, and never
Speaker 1: wanted to match again. Each item felt smaller, less meaningful,
Speaker 1: just things, not markers of a shared life. The anger
Speaker 1: curdled into dull lake. I let myself cry at last,
Speaker 1: hunched over our kitchen sink, face in my hands, breath
Speaker 1: coming in ragged stutters. By the time my breathing, slow
Speaker 1: darkness had settled in. I poured a glass of water
Speaker 1: and walked through the empty living room, pausing at the
Speaker 1: balcony door. The city pressed in, noisy, anonymous, scattered with light.
Speaker 1: I thought about stepping outside, letting the wind hit my face,
Speaker 1: but I wasn't ready yet to be pushed forward. Instead,
Speaker 1: I turned to the last thing I could control, the
Speaker 1: record of our marriage, the one place Matt's presence lingered
Speaker 1: in plain sight. I walked back to the dining table
Speaker 1: and set my phone beside the coffee mug. Before I
Speaker 1: could overthink, I opened our joint Instagram, sliding through the stories,
Speaker 1: the perfect arrangements, the small captions and layer jokes. For
Speaker 1: a long moment, that record felt like both a betrayal
Speaker 1: and a comforter catalog of all the times I believed
Speaker 1: in us, proved that for a while we've been real.
Speaker 1: My thumb hovered over the settings, the big red button
Speaker 1: de leade account. Are you sure? It asked, the most
Speaker 1: dangerous question of all. In knee end, I hit yes.
Speaker 1: I powered off my phone, pressed it face down on
Speaker 1: the table, and crossed to the balcony. I pushed the
Speaker 1: door open. Light in the cold, ere slapped my cheeks,
Speaker 1: watched the rain glimmering under the orange street lies below.
Speaker 1: The city sounded different without some one waiting inside, less
Speaker 1: of a home, more of a possibility. For the first time,
Speaker 1: with the silence of my back in the world and
Speaker 1: carrying ahead, I understood that uncertain he could feel almost
Speaker 1: like relief. The cold on my skin was all edge,
Speaker 1: a reminder of what I didn't want to feel. That
Speaker 1: made everything sharper, every sense more electric. I gripped the
Speaker 1: balcony rail, letting the rangerssele down over my knuckles. The
Speaker 1: lights mirrored and swimming below me, Chicutgo's traffic come in
Speaker 1: the distance, alive in ways, I wasn't sure. I wanted
Speaker 1: to be above and behind. The condo was too still,
Speaker 1: furniture arranged for a couple, every object betraying its purpose
Speaker 1: now that we'd split into separate orbits. Eventually, my feet
Speaker 1: ache were chill, and I went inside to find warm
Speaker 1: shuffling through the darkened space. I left the lights off
Speaker 1: even so I could feel everything glaring at me, the
Speaker 1: missing shoes, the low mug, a jacket. Mat never picked up.
Speaker 1: I wandered to the bedroom and sat at the edge
Speaker 1: of the bed, staring at my hands, not even sure
Speaker 1: if I was crying. Maybe I'd passed through the part
Speaker 1: into numbness. Maybe grief had already shaped, shifted into a
Speaker 1: hundred smaller seeker things that would keep springing up for weeks.
Speaker 1: It was closed to midnight when my phone buzzed again,
Speaker 1: Not Mat, not Tash. This time it was Rachel. I
Speaker 1: hesitated thumb, hovering, torn between craving of voice in the
Speaker 1: void and the urge to be nobody to no one
Speaker 1: for once. But when have I ever said no to
Speaker 1: a friend in need, specially one whose apology still harmmed
Speaker 1: in my veinanes I opened the message A single line,
Speaker 1: Can I bring you coffee to morrow, no demands. I stared, uncertain,
Speaker 1: my gut twisted, torn between shame and comfort. In our group,
Speaker 1: showing up always meant something. It could mean rescue, or betrayal,
Speaker 1: or just plains of ival. I type back, only if
Speaker 1: you don't mind silence. I don't have words yet her
Speaker 1: reply came instantly. Silence is my specialty. The next morning,
Speaker 1: Rachel showed up just after eight, umbrella dripping on the hole.
Speaker 1: We mat She handed me a cup, my usual, but
Speaker 1: Milclotte extra hot, and said nothing. We sat at the
Speaker 1: little kitchen table, looking at opposite walls. The only sounds
Speaker 1: the click of mugs and the city humming below. After
Speaker 1: a while, she ventured, you don't have to talk, but
Speaker 1: I'm here if you want to hate some one, even me.
Speaker 1: I shook my head, realizing just how tight my dol was. No,
Speaker 1: you tried to warn me, didn't you, she winced. I
Speaker 1: saw him spirally live. I thought I could protect you
Speaker 1: by backing away, but I think I made it worse.
Speaker 1: I'm so sorry. I surprised myself by reaching for her hand.
Speaker 1: Her fingers were cold as mine, but there was relief there.
Speaker 1: It wasn't absolution, but it was proof I wasn't completely
Speaker 1: alone inside the wreckage. We sat for almost an hour,
Speaker 1: sometimes talking and sometimes not. She told me Jeremy had
Speaker 1: called her cloalless as ever, asking if I got in
Speaker 1: food poisoning on Saturday, or if Olivia and Matt just
Speaker 1: needed a couple's weakened. We snorted, almost involuntarily. Brent had
Speaker 1: apparently texted Matt offering beers no questions to probably thinking
Speaker 1: this was about work or some dumb mail right of passage.
Speaker 1: I almost laughed. Did none of us ever dare believe
Speaker 1: things were really broken? Rachel squeezed my hand. If I'd known,
Speaker 1: if I'd known it was Sadie, I would have told
Speaker 1: you live. But she just appeared one day. I thought
Speaker 1: he was just being dramatic, you know, classic Matt. But this,
Speaker 1: she shook her head. I let the anger surface, roar
Speaker 1: in hot Did she know about me, about the rest
Speaker 1: of us? Rachel shook her head. I don't think so,
Speaker 1: or she didn't care. But Matt, he's the one who
Speaker 1: makes choices. He could have told her or stopped, or
Speaker 1: told you the truth. I nodded, slowly, letting it sink in.
Speaker 1: He said he'd answer my questions, But what's left to ask?
Speaker 1: Rachel hesitated nothing you don't already know. Just let us
Speaker 1: help if you want. She left me with her umbrella,
Speaker 1: a practical kindness that somehow felt more intimate than any confession.
Speaker 1: I put the umbrella by the door and text to Tasher,
Speaker 1: coffee soon, I need my army. The days after that
Speaker 1: coalesced around what I now recognized this aftermath or it
Speaker 1: became a theater of pretending. But even the praetors wabbled,
Speaker 1: so I stopped apologizing for my blankness. Tasher and I
Speaker 1: spent hours walking the cities riverside her quiet and steadied,
Speaker 1: letting me fill the air or leave it empty. Sometimes
Speaker 1: we circled the topic. Sometimes we left it dormant, studying
Speaker 1: the skyline instead. There was a safety in the routines,
Speaker 1: in being driven not by Matt's absences, but by my
Speaker 1: own presence to be here for myself, not in spite
Speaker 1: of someone else's dishonor. Meanwhile, the group chat that had
Speaker 1: once been out daily anchor became a snarl of careful cheer.
Speaker 1: Jeremy posted a meme about adulting that only acknowledged. Brent
Speaker 1: sent a video of his dog falling off a couch.
Speaker 1: Even Rachel Pray for foolish or simply done with hiding,
Speaker 1: started dropping in jokes, as though the air hadn't been poisoned.
Speaker 1: It was enough to make me cry one night, not
Speaker 1: out of loss, but out of the twisted love of
Speaker 1: people determined to be normal even as the ground shifted.
Speaker 1: I went grocery shopping alone for the first time in months,
Speaker 1: lingering over which coffee to buy, which snacks to choose.
Speaker 1: Now that I didn't have to factor in someone else's corks,
Speaker 1: I toted my own bags home and put them away
Speaker 1: in my own order, reorganizing the cabinet so the things
Speaker 1: I loved were up front. It didn't feel like freedom,
Speaker 1: not yet. It felt like permission to at least start
Speaker 1: practicing in quieter hours. Late at night, shehes padded across
Speaker 1: cold floor. I found myself flipping back through emails, receipts
Speaker 1: everywheremant of us. Sometimes I caught myself composing messages to
Speaker 1: Matt Did you ever even regret it? Did you wake
Speaker 1: up and wonder how bad it could get? But I
Speaker 1: never sent them. The only messages I replied to were
Speaker 1: the ones from my friends. Small stitches holding my inside together.
Speaker 1: My sister called late one evening, was gentle but clear.
Speaker 1: How's a condo still home? I hesitated, sort of. It's empty,
Speaker 1: too empty sometimes, But to mine good, she said, as
Speaker 1: if that settled everything. After I hung up, another text
Speaker 1: from Matt appeared on my Scarine so short I almost missed.
Speaker 1: Can I pick up the rest of my things tomorrow?
Speaker 1: I'll be quick. I stared a long while at the
Speaker 1: blinking cursor, not knowing if I'd let him in or not.
Speaker 1: The answer that came to mind was the simplest, the
Speaker 1: only one I had left. You can come to morrow
Speaker 1: at one. I'll be out The next morning, cloudy quite,
Speaker 1: I boxed up what was left of mass life in
Speaker 1: our condo. I worked steadily, keeping my hands busy, until
Speaker 1: the box, too small and too light, was filled with
Speaker 1: all the trivial evidence that a life together can sometimes
Speaker 1: shrink down to objects. Raise it a phone charger the
Speaker 1: sweathird had tried to inhale just days ago, the mop
Speaker 1: with a chip I always hated. I tucked it by
Speaker 1: the door with as much attention as I could stand.
Speaker 1: By the time holly clock town noon, I had my
Speaker 1: coat on and was gone, leaving the door unlocked, my
Speaker 1: phone tucked away in a pocket, I took a walk,
Speaker 1: the longest loop I could manage, along the river, ignoring
Speaker 1: all the obvious memories. My feet hurt and my breast shudder.
Speaker 1: But when I returned, both the box and the last
Speaker 1: of matched shoes were gone. No note, no message, not
Speaker 1: even a last attempt at a joke, orpally just gone. I
Speaker 1: closed the door behind me and leaned there, letting the
Speaker 1: familiar space reaps of a little of my wheat. It
Speaker 1: wasn't healing, not instantly, but it felt decisive, a severing,
Speaker 1: cleaner than anything words could offer. The space where his
Speaker 1: keys had been was empty. Without thinking, I swept the
Speaker 1: little trequleine, dropped it into a cabinet. It rained again
Speaker 1: that afternoon, a soft, relentless patter against the glass. I
Speaker 1: sat at the table, pushed my phone away, and let
Speaker 1: myself just exist, not as a half hour winded thing,
Speaker 1: but as someone learning her own outline all over again.
Speaker 1: For a moment, I watched the traffic moving on the
Speaker 1: street below, the umbrella figures vanishing and reforming in the puddles.
Speaker 1: No revelations, no declarations, just the ordinary, relentless motion of
Speaker 1: a city that would never pause for one small hot break,
Speaker 1: I found myself breathing easier with each minute Mat was gone.
Speaker 1: There was pain, and it was real, but it wasn't
Speaker 1: all that remained. And so alone in the lamp light,
Speaker 1: I gathered the smaller sense of forward motion, of fragile
Speaker 1: and sure, a step into silence that was finally my
Speaker 1: own