Speaker 1: The smell of slowly charring corn and wood smoke always
Speaker 1: makes me think of the beginning of summer, the shudder
Speaker 1: and settle of warm air just before a sudden dusk,
Speaker 1: the cling of mosquito spray, the pop of a champagne cork,
Speaker 1: and the light, hazy sound of people laughing through my
Speaker 1: open kitchen windows. We host this barbecue every year, no
Speaker 1: matter what has happened, new jobs, big moves, phrenetic deadlines,
Speaker 1: personal winds, losses, round number birthdays. I used to believe
Speaker 1: the tradition meant that the center held whatever the weather.
Speaker 1: This time it felt different, though I tried not to
Speaker 1: let that show. I dished jalapenos a little too fine,
Speaker 1: ruining their crunch as my thumb skimmed my phone every
Speaker 1: few minutes, expecting Andrew to text with an update on
Speaker 1: his route home. He should have been here by now,
Speaker 1: had promised to pick up ice, his specialty be a cooler.
Speaker 1: The impossible to find garlic sausages, he said, were the
Speaker 1: soul of summer. In dead A single vibration buzzed across
Speaker 1: the butcher block, and I wiped my hands, checked the message, Babe, sorry,
Speaker 1: caught up with a long run, and Ben's car died
Speaker 1: near the trail head, bringing him a jump. Not sure
Speaker 1: how long might be late, Don't wait on me, Love you,
Speaker 1: The cheerful tone ending with love you stuck out. I
Speaker 1: realized how much it mimicked the way people wrote post
Speaker 1: its to themselves. Practical upbeat, except that Andrew had never
Speaker 1: once missed our barbecue, not one in six years. He
Speaker 1: called these our favorite day. Always dragged friends into setting
Speaker 1: up the back yard lights, insisted on playlist curation to
Speaker 1: the point of iroling arguments. I began answering the door
Speaker 1: with tight, practiced warmth. Andrew's on a rescue mission. I
Speaker 1: joked to Sabrina, who brought two cheap bottles of rosee
Speaker 1: and a cooler with suspiciously fancied cheese. He'll be back
Speaker 1: to dominate the grill, probably with stories about mud and disaster.
Speaker 1: She squeezed my hand, eyebrows, rising, you're too calm, want
Speaker 1: me to threaten his job security? We laughed, the brittle,
Speaker 1: polite kind. I brushed off the question and set her
Speaker 1: up as co host, tasks I knew would keep eyes
Speaker 1: off me for now. Friends craned their necks looking down
Speaker 1: the driveway plates started to circle half finished, as guests
Speaker 1: kept glancing at their watches. During the first pass of burghers,
Speaker 1: I let everyone believe Andrew was just running late, maybe
Speaker 1: he'd show up any minute. Shoes spattered, smile sheepish, holding
Speaker 1: an energy drink for comic effect, but the sky deepened
Speaker 1: from blue to violet, and his absences mark the night,
Speaker 1: subtle at first and then undeniably present. By the time
Speaker 1: Mark and Olivia tried to salvage their side dish mishap
Speaker 1: a burned tray of vegetable skewers. My phone buzzed again,
Speaker 1: try to save me, some of your guark. Should only
Speaker 1: be thirty forty more minutes, but the next hour slipped away,
Speaker 1: and then everyone began organizing around on the fact that
Speaker 1: Andrew was definitely not coming clean up after these parties
Speaker 1: had been his territory, a learned partnership built over years,
Speaker 1: and I hated every second of being left with the
Speaker 1: sticky glasses and salsa bowls. The guest list filtered out, hugs,
Speaker 1: turning awkward, A couple friends offering to stay and help,
Speaker 1: but never pressing when I said, no, thanks, I've got
Speaker 1: it alone. Rinsing out the last remnants of wine from
Speaker 1: the porch banister. I picked up Andrew's backpack from where
Speaker 1: he tossed it usually for me to nag him about
Speaker 1: mud on the floor. As I went to carry it upstairs,
Speaker 1: a couple items spilled out. A pair of trail shoes
Speaker 1: caked with red dirt more like clay than anything in
Speaker 1: the city parks, and a crumpled energy bar wrapper with
Speaker 1: a logo for Elkwood twenty five K. I turned it over.
Speaker 1: The event location was in Silverborough, a small city two
Speaker 1: hours away, but Andrew had said he was training for
Speaker 1: a marathon on the city's river belt, not Silverborough. I
Speaker 1: held the wrapper and told myself not to make it
Speaker 1: into something unkind or unreasonable. Runners swap gear. Maybe he
Speaker 1: picked it up second hand. Maybe Ben was the one
Speaker 1: training for that run. Besides, Andrew never lied to me,
Speaker 1: not in ways that mattered. The rest of the night,
Speaker 1: I tried to let go of the oddity, washing away
Speaker 1: doubt in the hum of the dish washer, but the
Speaker 1: taste of unease was sharp and flat on my tongue
Speaker 1: until I fell asleep alone in our bed The next
Speaker 1: morning held that peculiar quiet that comes after a party.
Speaker 1: The kitchen littered with bottles, the grill, kneading, scrubbing, empty
Speaker 1: bowls stacked on the counter. I rinsed everything, distractedly, replaying
Speaker 1: each interaction with guests the night before. The easy teasing
Speaker 1: questions where s Andrew and marks, The clipped jokes about
Speaker 1: Andrew using another training day as an excuse for a
Speaker 1: long nap settled in my mind like grainy sand I
Speaker 1: cycled through my typical post barbecue ritual, left over, chilly
Speaker 1: in tupperware playlist, still looping, Andrew finally staggered in, hair
Speaker 1: flattened with sweat lines. He flashed an exhausted smile, a
Speaker 1: little guilty, a lot apologetic nightmare of a run. Ben's
Speaker 1: car battery just gave up in the middle of nowhere.
Speaker 1: He did a sheepish gesture, mussing his own hair. Sorry,
Speaker 1: I missed the whole thing. Ha, I nodded, getting him
Speaker 1: a glass of water. Everyone noticed. I told them you
Speaker 1: were off saving the world. He winced. Yeah, felt terrible.
Speaker 1: He started unloading his shorts, pockets, keys, a little cash,
Speaker 1: a shredded receipt I figured was for gas, and his phone,
Speaker 1: which he almost immediately began scrolling through. Did I miss
Speaker 1: any legendary grilling complaints. I'd always thought we were pretty
Speaker 1: good at the easy story, the couple who could laugh
Speaker 1: at the mist moments, who bounced back, who didn't sweat
Speaker 1: the small stuff. I said, just the usual, Mark, and
Speaker 1: Olivia charred the eggplant into ash. Sabrina threatened to take
Speaker 1: over the playlist. I fielded a dozen concerned texts about
Speaker 1: your absence. He gave a willing groan, did a little bow.
Speaker 1: I will wash every dish. We worked in silence, then
Speaker 1: a little too carefully avoiding the subject. He didn't mention Silverborough,
Speaker 1: or why his shoes looked like they de run through
Speaker 1: a brickyard, not our local river path. Instead, he leaned
Speaker 1: over the sink, scrubbing and told me about odd wild
Speaker 1: life on the trail and how Ben's phone had spotty reception.
Speaker 1: It felt plausible, normal, if slightly practiced. That afternoon, I
Speaker 1: let the moment slide. I set the energy bar wrapper
Speaker 1: on our catchull shelf, meaning to toss it, but never
Speaker 1: quite doing so. Andrew napped by dinner. He was cheerful
Speaker 1: and teasing, thumbs dancing on his phone while I stirred stirfry.
Speaker 1: We didn't mention the barbecue again. It was easier. Still,
Speaker 1: I found myself rewinding memories, testing their integrity. How had
Speaker 1: we landed here where an absent husband could tilt the
Speaker 1: world's balance seven years ago? It was all charm. He
Speaker 1: noticed me at a friend's concert, first called out my
Speaker 1: saucerer laugh and teased that I probably tricked the band
Speaker 1: into an encore. I shot back something about graphic designers
Speaker 1: being moody. He took my number, and by midnight we
Speaker 1: were off with a haphazard group to a secret speakeasy,
Speaker 1: exchanging secrets like kids trading cards. He could be the
Speaker 1: loudest guy in a packed bar, or quietly attentive in
Speaker 1: a kitchen at three in the morning, building a fort
Speaker 1: out of coat piles. We came alive in crowds, food festivals,
Speaker 1: roof top wine tastings, themed parties. Some are barbecues, our
Speaker 1: shared super Bowl. Even after our wedding, we were the hosts,
Speaker 1: the couple people expected to be first on any social VP,
Speaker 1: the ones bringing five kinds of dip and twice as
Speaker 1: many stories. Andrew had a knack for gathering strays, colleagues
Speaker 1: who didn't know any one, friends brought by plus one
Speaker 1: people who wandered in just because the house lights seemed
Speaker 1: warm from the street. Work for me was a different
Speaker 1: kind of mania. Project management at a small but fast
Speaker 1: text start up, all hands and red flags and late
Speaker 1: night slack messages. Andrew, unpredictable but reliable, handled freelance graphic gigs.
Speaker 1: He built logos and launched websites in our guest room studio,
Speaker 1: alternately thriving on the freedom and cursing the feast or
Speaker 1: famine income cycle. He loved that I had a real schedule,
Speaker 1: and I envied his flannel swayed Tuesday mornings. Finances had
Speaker 1: always been manageable, even when a few clients ghosted him
Speaker 1: last fall. We adjusted skipping a trip, cooking more at home.
Speaker 1: Late night conversations about scraping by it wore him down.
Speaker 1: He Withdrew carved a space inside himself that I knew
Speaker 1: better than to push into. After a cold, silent winter,
Speaker 1: running plucked him out, At first a lark, then suddenly
Speaker 1: a full on obsession. Trail shoes, Strava, spreadsheets, weak ND
Speaker 1: training trips. As he started calling them, he seemed lighter.
Speaker 1: I encouraged. It brought him obnoxiously neon Socks joked with
Speaker 1: Sabrina that soon I'd have to start running too, just
Speaker 1: to get time with my own husband. We'd never been
Speaker 1: the jealous types, at least not outwardly. My family scattered
Speaker 1: but loving, checked in by phone, his parents living just
Speaker 1: south of the city, sometimes dropped by for drinks, always
Speaker 1: down for a story or a fuss over Andrew's latest
Speaker 1: passion project. Friends, our tight little galaxy, knew everything or
Speaker 1: thought they did. Mark Andrew's childhood friend. Firm handshake and
Speaker 1: easy loyalty. Sabrina and Olivia, my allies from early work life,
Speaker 1: now full blown confidants. We talked, I trusted. If anyone
Speaker 1: couldn't keep up with the social world, it was usually Andrew,
Speaker 1: smiling but quietly ducking out early pleading exhaustion. That's why
Speaker 1: these small cracks, the quirks of his recent routines, started
Speaker 1: to unsettle me. After the barbecue, he was ab somehow,
Speaker 1: even when physically home. He spent hours sorting race playlists.
Speaker 1: I found him standing in the dining room with a
Speaker 1: glazed overlook, staring out at the overgrown hydranger. He claimed
Speaker 1: it was runner brain and made jokes about me catching
Speaker 1: the bug if I wasn't careful. I scrolled his training
Speaker 1: calendar on the fridge and noticed a few scribbles dates
Speaker 1: I didn't recognize, arrows pointing to weekend mornings with odd
Speaker 1: notations early start, Silverborough, followed by group clean up. One
Speaker 1: Tuesday night, folding laundry, I found a wrinkled restaurant receipt
Speaker 1: tucked into the pocket of his windbreaker the kennel bar
Speaker 1: and brunch Edgeton sixty two dollars and thirty seven cents.
Speaker 1: I blinked at the unfamiliar name. Edgeton was nearly three
Speaker 1: hours south. I double checked the date was last Saturday,
Speaker 1: the same day he'd said he was running downtown Loops,
Speaker 1: coming home just after lunch. Flushed but not exhausted, I
Speaker 1: placed the slip on his nights down and thinking maybe
Speaker 1: it would jog his memory that he'd mention grabbing a
Speaker 1: pick up order with friends. The next morning, he seemed
Speaker 1: distracted again, pouring too much cream into his coffee, barely
Speaker 1: acknowledging eye demade his toast. I asked, casual as I could,
Speaker 1: how was your long run on Saturday? He stretched, rubbed
Speaker 1: his jaw, then grinned, hot as hell. I think I
Speaker 1: lost track of time those last miles. I bonked completely.
Speaker 1: He grabbed the receipt, crumpled it in one hand, and
Speaker 1: lobbed it into the recycling without reading it. Hey, your
Speaker 1: guark was the star the other night shift slide pivot
Speaker 1: to safety. I said nothing, tried to believe it was innocent,
Speaker 1: but inside me, something cold and patient began to stir.
Speaker 1: A few days later, Sabrina stopped by after work to
Speaker 1: trade horror stories about office drama and to vent while
Speaker 1: the wine is cold. She tumbled into a patio chair
Speaker 1: and swung her feet up, peering over her sunglasses. So
Speaker 1: was Andrew out with his running colt again on Sunday.
Speaker 1: Swear he's gone full marathon monk. She paused to draw
Speaker 1: out the teas, then said, actually, I saw him at
Speaker 1: Wolfhound Trail. He looked busy, chatting with a group. They
Speaker 1: all nodded at me, but kind of scattered. Didn't think
Speaker 1: he was that organized. I frowned. He didn't mention seeing you.
Speaker 1: Usually he rags on your posture when you run. She cackled.
Speaker 1: Maybe he was distracted. There was a tall blonde too,
Speaker 1: just a flash, but she looked like she was giving
Speaker 1: race instructions. Or something. You ever met his team mates,
Speaker 1: He always says, it's a gaggle of gear heads. I
Speaker 1: shook my head, doing a quick count of the names
Speaker 1: I'd heard, Ben Theo sometimes a gen, but I'd never
Speaker 1: met any one outside a handful of photos he'd texted
Speaker 1: from group finish lines. Later that night, I asked him
Speaker 1: you running with a group Sunday. He was sitting on
Speaker 1: the bed, laptop open in front of him, map tabs scattered. Yeah,
Speaker 1: sometimes we finish on different trails. Wolfhound is so busy,
Speaker 1: people split up, Sabrina said, Hay, but I didn't get
Speaker 1: a chance to catch up. He barely glanced up from
Speaker 1: the screen, eyes sliding over emails, fingers restless. He answered
Speaker 1: with the rhythm of someone reading, not talking. His sleep
Speaker 1: changed after that, gone with a gentle sighing. The reach
Speaker 1: for me. In the night, he thrashed sheets, twisted, woke
Speaker 1: before dawn to slip in and out of showers, sometimes
Speaker 1: only running water for a couple minutes. There was an edge,
Speaker 1: a prickly self consciousness. I sometimes woke at three, hearing
Speaker 1: the click of his laptop in the office. On a
Speaker 1: Saturday morning, he dressed for another long run stretching theatrically,
Speaker 1: pretending to take a fence. When I groaned at waking early,
Speaker 1: I'll join you, I offered, teasing, I can be competitive.
Speaker 1: Give me a chance to embarrass myself. He closed his
Speaker 1: bag with a crisp snap. Honestly, the hills are rough,
Speaker 1: and I get crazy, like don't want to risk our
Speaker 1: marriage over me snapping at you for going too slow,
Speaker 1: he laughed, Next time we do a flat This weekend's
Speaker 1: all insanity. He slipped out before sunrise. The silence in
Speaker 1: the house afterward, somehow louder for it. In the following weeks,
Speaker 1: these absences bloomed dinners out with friends. He cut them short,
Speaker 1: saying he needed an early night or had a call
Speaker 1: with a client. Excuses became currency. He missed Mark's birthday dinner,
Speaker 1: entirely left early from Olivia's housewarming. Money grew odd too,
Speaker 1: for reasons I couldn't articulate. I checked our online statements.
Speaker 1: One night for our usual budgeting, he withdrawn three hundred
Speaker 1: fifty dollars cash from an eight m in Oakmont, a
Speaker 1: neighborhood we never visit. Three days earlier. We rarely used cash,
Speaker 1: except for the flea market or a few food trucks.
Speaker 1: I tapped out a message, did you use cash for something?
Speaker 1: Big donation? He shrugged when I showed him our statement.
Speaker 1: Some shops on the trail don't take cards, garage sales
Speaker 1: for gear and group stuff. We did a fundraiser for
Speaker 1: trail clean up. The explanation made sense in a surface way,
Speaker 1: but the number stuck in my brain. I wanted to
Speaker 1: believe what he said. Maybe I was becoming suspicious for
Speaker 1: no reason. I told myself in a self scolding way
Speaker 1: that digging for trouble turns up only trouble. Then Mark,
Speaker 1: who'd never been subtle, raised the tension months into these small,
Speaker 1: festering doubts. After a quick dinner half way through the week,
Speaker 1: he cornered me by the fridge as Andrew cleaned up dishes.
Speaker 1: So I was at Owl's cafe other day. Saw Andrew
Speaker 1: there with a woman, tall, kind of sporty, dark ponatill
Speaker 1: seemed cool. Must be one of his race buddies. Right,
Speaker 1: he watched my face for too long. I kept my
Speaker 1: smile in place. Sure, probably another runner, maybe Jen from
Speaker 1: his club. On the drive home, I replayed Mark's words.
Speaker 1: Why had Andrew mentioned that cafe, or any woman but Jen,
Speaker 1: who I'd seen only once and who looked nothing like
Speaker 1: the woman Mark described. One night, unable to sleep past
Speaker 1: three a m. I scrolled through my phone calendar, matching
Speaker 1: Andrew's run dates with the marathon training plans I'd looked
Speaker 1: up online. His notes didn't match. He'd registered for a
Speaker 1: fall event, the River Belt Marathon, but most of his
Speaker 1: training weekends were long before or after any one would
Speaker 1: taper for such a run, and the Silverborough Run. The
Speaker 1: location from the energy bar wrapper wasn't even on his
Speaker 1: supposed calendar. I confronted him about the cash the mismatch.
Speaker 1: He laughed, did a hand wavy gesture, said I was
Speaker 1: lucky I didn't get roped into planning the fundraiser. They're
Speaker 1: all a mess. He did a stilted dance, put on
Speaker 1: a podcast, and boomed it through the kitchen, shutting down conversation. Lately,
Speaker 1: if he wasn't irritated with me, he was gone from
Speaker 1: my mind, hyper focused on his phone, working late, pounding
Speaker 1: out freelance edits. But I saw only blank tabs and
Speaker 1: occasional half finished mock ups. When I passed his office,
Speaker 1: my worry grew became a private anxiety humming in the
Speaker 1: background of meetings and during runs of my own. Andrew
Speaker 1: was physically in the house, but never really present, his
Speaker 1: dinners left half eaten, every empty space in the fridge
Speaker 1: filled with new gels, powders, shiny neon training snacks. In
Speaker 1: a fit of self doubt, one Thursday, I asked Sabrina
Speaker 1: if she'd heard Andrew talk about upcoming races or teammates
Speaker 1: when he was with the friend group. She shook her head. Never,
Speaker 1: he talks about trails, but not people. He mostly listens
Speaker 1: to us complain about our jobs or Mark's new hobby.
Speaker 1: Maybe he's shy, she frowned. Are you sure he's running
Speaker 1: as much as he says, he doesn't look tired. He
Speaker 1: barely eats. Honestly, I think he likes shopping for gear
Speaker 1: more than he likes to actually run. It was a
Speaker 1: pointed thing to say, but she didn't linger on it.
Speaker 1: That night, driving Andrew's car to pick up take out,
Speaker 1: mine had a head light out. I found a pair
Speaker 1: of women's sunglasses tucked beside the emergency brake, big, fashionably
Speaker 1: rose tinted, not the style either of us wore. He'd
Speaker 1: cleaned the car recently, so they stood out immediately when
Speaker 1: I asked, trying to sound light, did you grab these
Speaker 1: from some one at the run. They're cute, but definitely
Speaker 1: not your look. He didn't meet my eyes. Ah, probably
Speaker 1: someone from the trail ride. People swap seats every one
Speaker 1: throws their stuff in. Could be gens. I'll bring them
Speaker 1: to next week's meet up. A practiced lie or just tiredness.
Speaker 1: I couldn't tell. I told myself I needed proof, not paranoia.
Speaker 1: The next day, he left his phone on the kitchen
Speaker 1: counter while shehpuring. My hands shook as I thumbed the
Speaker 1: screen open. He never changed his code. I scrolled past
Speaker 1: the group chats, mostly gear talk and memes, and slid
Speaker 1: into his Instagram d MS direct messages with someone named
Speaker 1: Sophie Evans, none of which I recognized. There was a
Speaker 1: flurry lots of inside jokes, some about finish lines, a
Speaker 1: few complaining about city drivers. She de sent him photos
Speaker 1: of dogs, trails, a picture of a coffee cup with
Speaker 1: a message, you'll need this after the climb next weekend.
Speaker 1: My stomach twisted, but they weren't overtly romantic, not that
Speaker 1: I could see. I closed the app and put the
Speaker 1: phone back. When he came downstairs, towel around his waist.
Speaker 1: He was humming, either unaware any boundary had been crossed,
Speaker 1: or hiding something expertly. I spent the next days walking
Speaker 1: myself in circles. Was Sophie a new friend? Were Andrew's
Speaker 1: late nights and frequent silences proof of something ugly? Or
Speaker 1: was I simply unraveling at the seams, inventing drama where
Speaker 1: a healthier person would shrug it off. Andrew noticed the
Speaker 1: tension one evening, as I chopped peppers for dinner. He
Speaker 1: leaned against the island a little hesitantly. You've seemed tense.
Speaker 1: Want to come on a group run this week end?
Speaker 1: His attempt at levity was flat. Most of the crew
Speaker 1: will be there, THEO ben jen. A couple new faces
Speaker 1: might be fun. I agreed against my better judgment, figuring
Speaker 1: that meeting his running friends would be a step towards
Speaker 1: something closure, reassurance, confirmation, or at least understanding. We drove
Speaker 1: out early. The lot was buzzing. A dozen people, mostly
Speaker 1: guys near Andrew's age. Two women, one slim and gray haired,
Speaker 1: one with a shock of pink hair under her cap.
Speaker 1: Neither matched the name Sophie Evans nor the cafe woman.
Speaker 1: Mark described laughing. They all stretched, talked, splits, ignored me pleasantly.
Speaker 1: Andrew seemed relaxed. He stuck near Ben, joked with THEO,
Speaker 1: introduced me as a sprinter trapped in a marathon wife's body.
Speaker 1: I managed a smile, did not attempt the full course,
Speaker 1: peeled off after two slow miles. At the end, clammy
Speaker 1: and unfit. I joined the group at the lot, and Andrew,
Speaker 1: already chatting with the others, introduced me lazily. There was
Speaker 1: no Sophie for the next few days. I felt the
Speaker 1: knot in my chest loosen. I apologized to Andrew for
Speaker 1: being suspicious, half joking, half ashamed. I think I panicked
Speaker 1: for no reason. Sorry for grilling you. He grinned, pulled
Speaker 1: me into a long hug, and suggested we go to
Speaker 1: our favorite sushi place for that week end. We were
Speaker 1: almost ourselves again. I wanted to believe that was the end.
Speaker 1: It should have been the end, but the universe, or
Speaker 1: Mark's restless curiosity, or maybe just plain fate wouldn't let
Speaker 1: it rest. A week later, as if to cauterize any
Speaker 1: healing wound, Mark forded a group photo from his friend Jake,
Speaker 1: a trail runner who'd gone with a bunch to a
Speaker 1: remote range outside the city. The photo, long and panoramic,
Speaker 1: showed the group in giddy post race disarray, muddy legs,
Speaker 1: thrown arms, cheap medals dangling, and Andrew standing close, almost
Speaker 1: shoulder to shoulder with a woman who looked surely definitely
Speaker 1: like Sophie Evans, based on a tagged Instagram name in
Speaker 1: the comments, I stared at the date. It was the
Speaker 1: same weekend Andrew claimed he was at a work project
Speaker 1: retreat for freelance designers, a story he'd spun with lots
Speaker 1: of laptop stress and fake sounding deadlines. The caption tagged
Speaker 1: Sophie directly. She looked comfortable next to Andrew, his hand
Speaker 1: hovering in that half familiar way I'd seen a dozen
Speaker 1: times when he didn't want to seem possessive but still
Speaker 1: wanted the intimacy to read. I read the comments twice,
Speaker 1: searching for some alternative meaning, but there was none. The
Speaker 1: next time Andrew ma mentioned getting out for a run,
Speaker 1: I froze. He was so cheerful, so obviously excited, that
Speaker 1: it made my insides feel raw. Now evidence was stacking
Speaker 1: grains of it, falling relentlessly, a landslide of slights, each
Speaker 1: building toward what I still refused to fully confront. I knew,
Speaker 1: in the way someone knows a storm is rolling, in
Speaker 1: the way the sky smells acid sharp before thunder. I
Speaker 1: stopped asking about his runs, unless absolutely necessary, He stopped offering.
Speaker 1: We orbited each other, both actors in a play we
Speaker 1: had an auditioned for. It was after that, when the
Speaker 1: pieces began to strain under their own weight, that the
Speaker 1: real unraveling began. The first night I couldn't sleep, I
Speaker 1: went downstairs alone, wound through kitchen shadows, and poured myself
Speaker 1: a glass of wine. Our refrigerator hummed the digital clock
Speaker 1: over the stove, blinking two twenty five A. M. Andrew's
Speaker 1: running shoes sat by the door, their tread street red
Speaker 1: from the last trail. I stared at them for a while,
Speaker 1: a stupid non answer. I hated how these tiny, accumulating
Speaker 1: suspicions had made me less of myself, warier, quieter, Reaching
Speaker 1: for reassurance in silent rooms, I told myself it was
Speaker 1: just distance, that every couple had seasons, and maybe I
Speaker 1: was being petty threatened by a sport a circle I
Speaker 1: wasn't part of, but under the surface, tension clung to
Speaker 1: my skin. By midweek, I settled into small surveillance rituals,
Speaker 1: noticing what Andrew put in his gym bag, clocking the
Speaker 1: times he left and returned, unconsciously counting his laundry pile.
Speaker 1: Once I found a trail pass stamped Pinecrest Cliffs, three
Speaker 1: counties away and nowhere close to any trails he plotted
Speaker 1: on our shared calendar. No text from him that day,
Speaker 1: nothing about it at dinner, only a tired kiss on
Speaker 1: my hairline when I got home late. I didn't bring
Speaker 1: it up. After a hurried Thursday at work, I returned
Speaker 1: to find Andrew in his studio, headphones on on, lost
Speaker 1: in some dense wire frame for a rush project. He
Speaker 1: jumped when I touched his shoulder, as though he hadn't
Speaker 1: heard me come In. The screen flashed a design board,
Speaker 1: images layered and half labeled, the sort of O. C
Speaker 1: D organizing that always soothed him when he was truly working.
Speaker 1: I noticed a tab open in the background, hotel booking,
Speaker 1: a chain with decent weekend getaway rates. Working hard, I
Speaker 1: kept the question casual, but I watched for the flicker
Speaker 1: in his face. Yeah, client wants Banner's asap. I'm just
Speaker 1: finishing up the color schemes. He gestured for me to
Speaker 1: pull up a chair, but I declined, retreating to the kitchen.
Speaker 1: I lingered in the doorway. What's the hotel search for?
Speaker 1: Are we planning a trip? I don't know about? He
Speaker 1: was quicker than I was used to. Ha. No, just
Speaker 1: pricing for a mock up. I'm making graphics for a
Speaker 1: travel ad. The client gave me ten hotels to sample
Speaker 1: that fit almost but not exactly. I said no, nothing more,
Speaker 1: made dinner and noticed he barely ate. On Friday, Sabrina
Speaker 1: came over with tight takeout and an elaborate litany of
Speaker 1: her most recent misadventures. She sprawled across our couch picking
Speaker 1: at noodles. Is Andrew coming home to night? Or is
Speaker 1: he off doing Ironman cosplay again? I tried not to
Speaker 1: show I cared. He has hill repeats with the group
Speaker 1: in the morning, claims he needs all the carbs he
Speaker 1: can get. I attempted levity, but she frowned you two,
Speaker 1: going okay. It was blunt but not unsympathetic. Fine, just busy.
Speaker 1: The word rang thin. I changed the subject, pressed her
Speaker 1: for gossip about their new developer, but later, as we
Speaker 1: cleaned up containers, Sabrina nudged my arm. I mean it,
Speaker 1: call me if you need back up. Don't go all
Speaker 1: stoic project manager on me. I smiled, but after she left,
Speaker 1: I felt exposed, like she'd seen too much. Saturday dawned
Speaker 1: brittle and bright. I woke alone. My hand reached instinctively
Speaker 1: to Andrew's side of the bed sheets were cold. I
Speaker 1: padded to the kitchen, made coffee, and scrolled through our
Speaker 1: joint calendar. His trail run East Slope entry had a
Speaker 1: tiny lock icon next to it, as if accidentally made private.
Speaker 1: It was the only one. Every other training entry was public.
Speaker 1: By noon, our group chat filled with weak end updates,
Speaker 1: Olivia baking something disastrous, Mark stuck building ikea furniture. Andrew's
Speaker 1: phone buzzed once on the counter. I almost didn't look,
Speaker 1: but curiosity, now more like compulsion, won out. A notification.
Speaker 1: Sophie Evans sent a photo Lock's screen, only no preview.
Speaker 1: I set his phone back untouched. When Andrew came home,
Speaker 1: his calves were splattered with mud, but his shirt was clean,
Speaker 1: like he'd changed Before coming inside, he kissed me, mumbled
Speaker 1: something about legs of cement, then headed for the shower.
Speaker 1: I watched him go, feeling as if a thick pane
Speaker 1: of glass now stood between us. He hardly asked about
Speaker 1: my morning, didn't mention Sophie, didn't even complain about the trails,
Speaker 1: just let the routine float in. We cooked pasta, and
Speaker 1: he spent half the meal checking e mails. Work, he claimed,
Speaker 1: but I caught the faint glow of Instagram icons reflected
Speaker 1: in his glasses. Over the next week, Andrew grew both
Speaker 1: more charming and more absent. He'd break into spontaneous, almost
Speaker 1: forced jokes, bringing me coffee with elaborate barista art. He
Speaker 1: de tell me about ridiculous clients, odd moments with the
Speaker 1: grocery store cashier, banal harmless things. It was like watching
Speaker 1: someone redirect a river with carefully placed rocks. Yet at
Speaker 1: night he was elusive, sometimes not getting into bed until
Speaker 1: after midnight. When I glanced at his web browser left open.
Speaker 1: One morning, his search history was wiped. My own anxiety mushroomed.
Speaker 1: I started running after work, pounding out three feverish miles
Speaker 1: on the city trail. I didn't spot Andrew's group just
Speaker 1: nil teams of runners. I lingered outside the gear shop
Speaker 1: on Oakmont, watched through the window as a young brunette
Speaker 1: flirted with the staff. I hated what I was becoming.
Speaker 1: Two fridays later, Mark texted heading to the new Sider
Speaker 1: spot with a few you two in. I replied, yes,
Speaker 1: before checking with Andrew. That used to be the rule.
Speaker 1: He got home late, rubbed his face, looked conflicted. Babe,
Speaker 1: I promised the crew I'd do pacing for to morrow's
Speaker 1: long run at six. I'll be a bore at Sider night.
Speaker 1: I snapped more sharply than intended, So bail for once.
Speaker 1: We barely go out any more. He looked guilty, but
Speaker 1: didn't fight. I'll try, give me half an hour. He showered,
Speaker 1: then dressed in old jeans a band's shirt he knew
Speaker 1: I liked. It was almost enough to forget everything else.
Speaker 1: At the bar, we I met Mark and Sabrina ordered
Speaker 1: a flight each, but Andrew grew restless, quickly checking his watch,
Speaker 1: texting beneath the table. When Mark mentioned seeing blonde Sophie
Speaker 1: at the running shop, Andrew stiffened so minutely that I
Speaker 1: doubt anyone else noticed. Mark continued, oblivious. You should introduce
Speaker 1: Elena to more of your trail crew, expand the circle,
Speaker 1: or are they worried she'll smoke them in a five k?
Speaker 1: Andrew forced a laugh. They're shy, bunch of spreadsheet nerds.
Speaker 1: You be bored. Sabrina met my eyes unreadable. I cradled
Speaker 1: my sider glass, felt the pulse behind my teeth. We
Speaker 1: left early, Andrew with his crack of dawn, excuse me, trailing,
Speaker 1: disappointed at my own hopefulness. At home, the routine reset,
Speaker 1: Andrew set his alarm, prepped his water bottles. I said nothing,
Speaker 1: just watched the slow parade of ritual, wishing more than
Speaker 1: anything that he would, just, even for a moment, tell
Speaker 1: me the true truth, whatever it was that night's sleep
Speaker 1: wouldn't come. I scrolled Andrew's public Instagram, then clicked through
Speaker 1: the tagged photos in the Silverborough group's feed. Sophie featured
Speaker 1: in several smiling, arm in arm with another woman or two,
Speaker 1: sometimes with Andrew present in the group's periphery, but in
Speaker 1: one he and Sophie were alone at the finish, her
Speaker 1: arm around his waist, both laughing, filthy with mud, a
Speaker 1: kind of ease and intimacy that made my throat tighten
Speaker 1: the time stamp. It lined up perfectly with the freelance
Speaker 1: work crisis Andrew had used as an excuse to miss
Speaker 1: a dinner with Olivia and Mark. I raged inside, but
Speaker 1: when he returned home, soaked and spent, I could only
Speaker 1: greet him with a bland Hey, how was the hill work?
Speaker 1: He beamed real or perfectly faked? Best climb? Yet we
Speaker 1: spoke no more about it. After that week end, the
Speaker 1: betrayal's shifted shape became small, hidden, almost professional. Andrew started
Speaker 1: using more cash, offered less reason for his absences, and
Speaker 1: gave me brusque explanations whenever I got close to questioning him.
Speaker 1: For every answer, two new questions unfurled in my mind
Speaker 1: once I tried to break the invisible wall. Do you
Speaker 1: want me to come cheer you on next Saturday? There's
Speaker 1: the regional ten k, right? He flinched just a bit,
Speaker 1: then recovered, you hate morning crowds. Besides, it'll be over
Speaker 1: before you get there. Maybe the fall marathon bigger show.
Speaker 1: I wanted to argue, to insist, but something in his
Speaker 1: tone pushed me back. It was protectiveness maybe or avoidance.
Speaker 1: I recented both another night, at dinner with our circle,
Speaker 1: Olivia asked if Andrew had found a new design gig
Speaker 1: since he seemed so busy. He exhaled over, convincing, Oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: client s from out of state, so there's a lot
Speaker 1: of phone work. I'll be able to slow down after August. Mark,
Speaker 1: face open and unsuspicious, added, you're like a ghost lately, Andy,
Speaker 1: text me when you're bored. Man, we missed the old jew.
Speaker 1: Andrew looked away, busy with a napkin. I felt the
Speaker 1: table's attention hover, then drift. On the next day, I
Speaker 1: needed Andrew's car to borrow extra folding chairs from his
Speaker 1: parents for a meeting. As soon as I opened his
Speaker 1: glove compartment to find the insurance information, a blue plastic
Speaker 1: hotel loyalty card slid into my lap, the Shepherd Silverborough,
Speaker 1: with Andrew's name printed beneath in sharp bold type. I froze,
Speaker 1: stared at the details. Why would he have a loyalty
Speaker 1: card for a hotel two hours away? I shut the compartment,
Speaker 1: uneasy at home later, he didn't notice the card was missing.
Speaker 1: I slipped it back after memorizing the number. No mention,
Speaker 1: no mention of Silverborough. The next few days, my head
Speaker 1: spun with possibilities. Maybe he was building a pitch for
Speaker 1: travel clients, or had agreed to do branding for the hotel.
Speaker 1: But a deep, hard pit had formed in my stomach.
Speaker 1: I couldn't stop pulling at the thread. That night, I
Speaker 1: quietly asked, Sabrina, do you know us Sophie Evans? She
Speaker 1: keeps coming up in the group chat. Does she run
Speaker 1: with Andrew's friends? Sabrina shrugged, her tone circumspect never met her,
Speaker 1: Mark says he's seen her at race meet ups. Seems
Speaker 1: to know Andrew pretty well. Why I hesitated? Just trying
Speaker 1: to put faces to names. She's all over the running
Speaker 1: crew's tagged picks. Sabrina, always the observer, arched her eyebrow.
Speaker 1: You think she and Andrew? No way right? I shook
Speaker 1: my head quickly. I honestly don't know. My voice sounded
Speaker 1: lost even to me. Want me to do a little digging?
Speaker 1: She made it sound half a joke, I said no,
Speaker 1: but I could tell she filed the detail away. Work
Speaker 1: got harder. I grew snappish, impatient. I missed deadlines, found
Speaker 1: myself staring at my Slack window while others edited shared docks.
Speaker 1: Mind elsewhere. My boss caught me drifting in a meeting,
Speaker 1: asked quietly if I was okay. I mumbled something about migrins.
Speaker 1: One afternoon, desperate for clarity, I checked Sophie Evans Instagram
Speaker 1: for public posts. Most were trail photos, morning fog, clusters
Speaker 1: of runners, shots of her sneakers on cafe tables with
Speaker 1: captions like fueling up before the burn, but some inevitably
Speaker 1: included Andrew, sometimes across a table, once next to her
Speaker 1: on a bench, laughing over what looked like a shared sandwich,
Speaker 1: my body tipped with cold dread. One post from six
Speaker 1: weeks ago showed the brunch spot in Edgerton the same
Speaker 1: day as the receipt in Andrew's coat. Her caption first
Speaker 1: time running this trail with the best company survived at
Speaker 1: Andrew with a winking emoji. He hadn't commented publicly. That
Speaker 1: was the same Saturday he came home exhausted, claiming solo
Speaker 1: hill repeats. Panic briefly cinched my chest. I put my
Speaker 1: phone away, wanting desperately for the world to right itself,
Speaker 1: to turn away from this ugly, sticky suspicion. But there
Speaker 1: it was. Two timelines, impossibly overlapping. I stayed up late,
Speaker 1: scrolling through race registration databases, searching our last name Andrew's
Speaker 1: email on each big race's volunteer or result sheets. His
Speaker 1: stated event, the River Belt Marathon, was four months away,
Speaker 1: but his name only appeared on participant lists for the fall,
Speaker 1: not the summer events he claimed to have been heavily
Speaker 1: training for. Meanwhile, Sophie showed up everywhere, her results pinned
Speaker 1: to wee nds. Andrew had blocked out as work retreats.
Speaker 1: Unable to stop myself, I dialed the number for the
Speaker 1: Shepherd Hotel in Silverborough, keeping my voice even. Hi, I
Speaker 1: need to confirm a booking for my husband, Andrew Curtis
Speaker 1: for a future stay. Can you check if you have
Speaker 1: his loyalty number on file? The woman at the desk answered,
Speaker 1: polite and professional, Yes, mister Curtis, he and miss Sophia
Speaker 1: Evans just checked out last weekend. Do you want to
Speaker 1: reconfirm upcoming dates? I was careful, No, that's all, thank you.
Speaker 1: My voice didn't even tremble until the line went dead.
Speaker 1: My hands shook as I rested the phone on the counter.
Speaker 1: The facts lined up relentlessly. Hotel stays Edgerton brunch out
Speaker 1: of town travel unmentioned in his stories, always for clients
Speaker 1: or the group, But now there was no room for
Speaker 1: alternate explanations. I called Sabrina, this time, not caring if
Speaker 1: my grief spilled out. I have to tell you something,
Speaker 1: and I need you to listen before you say anything.
Speaker 1: She listened. At the end, she exhaled softly, you can't
Speaker 1: carry this by yourself. Do you want me to come over?
Speaker 1: I shook my head. She couldn't see me, but needing
Speaker 1: the denial to be spoken. No, not yet, I need
Speaker 1: to think. Her tone was gentle. You should confront him.
Speaker 1: If you wait, it'll destroy you. Later, as I tried
Speaker 1: to sleep, I lay next to Andrew, his breath even
Speaker 1: his back to me. The bed felt infinite. I thought
Speaker 1: of all the years we'd spent creating a life out
Speaker 1: of scraps and in jokes, music and shared dinners. I
Speaker 1: let myself cry quietly, as though spilling this pain in
Speaker 1: darkness could sponge some strength from the night. The next morning,
Speaker 1: I gave Andrew his coffee as usual, My hands didn't
Speaker 1: shake this time. He thanked me, smile, half formed. His
Speaker 1: mind already elsewhere he spent most of the day in
Speaker 1: his studio, only emerging at lunch to ask if I
Speaker 1: wanted anything from the deli. No thanks, I said my voice.
Speaker 1: Even at noon, I braced myself, checked his wallet again.
Speaker 1: Found the hotel key card still there, plus a crumpled
Speaker 1: punch card for Mondo muffins in Edjuton tenth one free.
Speaker 1: It was almost a joke, the banality of it. When
Speaker 1: he left for a run, I sat at the table,
Speaker 1: staring at our photos on the wall, all those smiling
Speaker 1: snap shots, trips, the ring of friends at last year's barbecue.
Speaker 1: I felt like I had been cast in amber, watching
Speaker 1: my own life from the outside. Sabrina texted, thinking about
Speaker 1: you here if you need it. That night, after Andrew returned,
Speaker 1: I asked for a talk. He looked wary, immediately setting
Speaker 1: his things down, but not defensive yet that would come.
Speaker 1: I steadied myself, pushed the evidence forward in my mind
Speaker 1: like tiles edging toward the abyss. I took one more
Speaker 1: long breath, filling my lungs with whatever was left of
Speaker 1: the world before certainty. Every fracture was pushing me toward
Speaker 1: the shattering edge. But in that moment, everything inside me
Speaker 1: crystallized into cold, hard determination. It was time. Andrew came
Speaker 1: in from his run, with his hair still damp, sneakers
Speaker 1: leaving little red flecks on the front mat. I was
Speaker 1: at the table, a thrum running through my hands as
Speaker 1: I stacked the evidence, literal and otherwise, in a careful
Speaker 1: row beside my coffee mug. He hung up his jacket oblivious,
Speaker 1: then turned at the subtle tension in the air the
Speaker 1: way I sat, rigid and deliberate. He muttered a breathless hay,
Speaker 1: stretching his arms, his eyes darted. I motioned, not trusting
Speaker 1: my voice yet, for him to sit across from me.
Speaker 1: He stalled for a second, a flicker of worry crossing
Speaker 1: his face, then smoothed over. Once I would have said
Speaker 1: it was a tell, reserved for bad news from a client.
Speaker 1: Now I saw it as something else. I tapped the
Speaker 1: edge of the table, not as an invitation, but a
Speaker 1: signal I wouldn't be put off. He sat, hands fidgeting
Speaker 1: with the seam of his shorts. I wanted to get
Speaker 1: it done, to walk straight through the fire. My mouth
Speaker 1: was dry. I started with hard facts, no accusations, just
Speaker 1: laying out each detail like stones. The energy bar from Silverborough,
Speaker 1: the Edjutont brunch receipt, the loyalty card for the Shepherd, Sophie,
Speaker 1: and the trail photos with you the same weekends you
Speaker 1: said you were somewhere else, the call to the hotel,
Speaker 1: Sophia checked in with you two weekends last month. Each
Speaker 1: fact bled into the next, a chain I couldn't unhook.
Speaker 1: Andrew's face was motionless at first, then gradually closed in,
Speaker 1: shoulders curving inward as the web closed around him. At
Speaker 1: Sophie in the group photos. His gaze flickered, sharp and searching,
Speaker 1: but he tried to hold calm. I laid out the calendar,
Speaker 1: the registration gaps, the Instagram d ms, which I did
Speaker 1: not have to open. Just naming them was enough. He
Speaker 1: opened his mouth shut it, then stammered, it's not that,
Speaker 1: isn't what it looks like. My voice was flat. What
Speaker 1: does it look like, Andrew? Because you weren't right with
Speaker 1: a group, You weren't on a work retreat, you were
Speaker 1: with her. I called the hotel. Please just don't make
Speaker 1: me drag it out. Do not insult me with more stories.
Speaker 1: He flinched, silence spiraled. The only noise the faint hum
Speaker 1: of the fridge and the wind cuffing the windows. I
Speaker 1: could feel my temples pounding the rules of our entire life,
Speaker 1: the quiet trust, the belief that if anything was wrong,
Speaker 1: we'd say it. Were bludgeoned by the ugly facts littered
Speaker 1: between us. He ran a palm over his jaw. Elina.
Speaker 1: I never wanted it to be I didn't mean for
Speaker 1: anything to happen with Sophie. At first. We just ran
Speaker 1: together a lot. I was low after the winter, after
Speaker 1: losing that campaign. I felt like shit, like I was
Speaker 1: failing at everything. Sophie she just, I don't know. She
Speaker 1: noticed it was easy to talk to her. She understood
Speaker 1: the scene, the freelance grind, what it feels like to
Speaker 1: be useless. I wanted to slap away the word understood instead,
Speaker 1: I said quietly, And you couldn't talk to me any more.
Speaker 1: He stumbled. It wasn't God, this isn't your fault. I
Speaker 1: just every time I looked at you, I felt worse
Speaker 1: about not pulling my weight, about ruining things. Sophie met
Speaker 1: me where I was. It helped. It got out of hand,
Speaker 1: out of hand, I repeated, acid rising, he swallowed, struggling
Speaker 1: to meet my eyes. It wasn't physical. Not at first,
Speaker 1: I swear hell. I thought it would blow over. But
Speaker 1: I started lying about the group runs so I could
Speaker 1: see her. Then I just didn't stop. I pressed how
Speaker 1: long his head dropped since March eight months? He finally
Speaker 1: looked up at me, eyes raw, as if asking for mercy,
Speaker 1: just for admitting it. I wanted to stop you. I
Speaker 1: always thought you'd see right through me. I felt my
Speaker 1: lips twist. You didn't count on how easy it is
Speaker 1: to hide in routine, did you? He didn't answer, only shrank,
Speaker 1: as if smaller would draw less pain. The numbness in
Speaker 1: my chest was almost welcome, a hard, bracing cold. I
Speaker 1: asked things I didn't want to know but needed. How
Speaker 1: many weekends, how much money? How many lies exchanged for
Speaker 1: little bursts of pleasure or comfort? He answered unevenly, sometimes vague,
Speaker 1: sometimes too detailed, the way gilt spills from a wound.
Speaker 1: When I asked if he loved her, he closed his eyes.
Speaker 1: I don't know I love you. Maybe I'm just broken.
Speaker 1: Anger burned away some of the numbness. Don't you dare
Speaker 1: give me the broken man's speech? Andrew, you made choices,
Speaker 1: kept making them, and every time you could have told
Speaker 1: me the truth. You ran further away instead, He winced,
Speaker 1: I know, I'm sorry. I tried to find a way out,
Speaker 1: but I couldn't lose her, and I couldn't lose you either.
Speaker 1: I just kept thinking, maybe this would fade. I couldn't
Speaker 1: believe how far we'd fallen, how much of my life
Speaker 1: had been rewritten. While I was cooking dinner, planning trips,
Speaker 1: laughing at old jokes. My skin itched with humil with loss.
Speaker 1: He tried again, voice pleading, I don't even know what
Speaker 1: happens now are we Are you kicking me out? I
Speaker 1: didn't answer. I just stood every muscle ringing you need
Speaker 1: to leave now. I can't have you here, not to night.
Speaker 1: Take your things and go to Mark's or wherever. But
Speaker 1: I need you out of this house. To morrow. We
Speaker 1: start with logistics, but I need to be alone before
Speaker 1: I lose whatever self control I have left. He nodded,
Speaker 1: as if physically struck, and slid from the chair. I
Speaker 1: heard him shuffle into the bedroom, packing with no apparent order,
Speaker 1: no protest. I busied myself with the dishes, hands shaking,
Speaker 1: breaking one small glass that cracked in my grip, andrew
Speaker 1: lingered in the doorway, duffel slung, eyes ringed with exhausted sadness,
Speaker 1: his lips parted, wanting to say something else, maybe to bargain,
Speaker 1: to reach for an old line between us. I shook
Speaker 1: my head no. I walked away before he could beg
Speaker 1: for forgiveness or twist the knife again. After the front
Speaker 1: door closed behind him, the silence in the house was thick,
Speaker 1: as though every object had shifted minutely in the light.
Speaker 1: I lasted all of ten minutes before my legs buckled
Speaker 1: and I slid to the floor in the kitchen, my
Speaker 1: sobs loosening in fits, snatching for air between them. The
Speaker 1: knowledge that he was gone, at least for now, punched
Speaker 1: through the numbness, opened up something wild and unprotected in me.
Speaker 1: When I could stand again, I went to our bedroom
Speaker 1: and methodically stripped his pillow case, folded it with unnecessary neatness,
Speaker 1: and stacked it on top of the running shirts he'd
Speaker 1: accidentally left behind. I didn't want the smell of him
Speaker 1: in my sheets, not to night, not when my sense
Speaker 1: of home was as shaky as my breath. I almost
Speaker 1: texted my sister, but I stopped, with my thumb hovering
Speaker 1: over the keyboard. Instead, I messaged Mark, Andrew will need
Speaker 1: a place to night, Please don't ask questions. Less than
Speaker 1: a minute later, Mark replied, say no more, I'm here.
Speaker 1: It gave me cold comfort, most of all because the
Speaker 1: fallout had only just begun, and I could already see
Speaker 1: the ring it would burn through the rest of our lives.
Speaker 1: I wasn't hungry. I opened the fridge, closed it, then
Speaker 1: drifted around the house, picking up objects, just to set
Speaker 1: them back down. My phone vibrated again, Sabrina, this time
Speaker 1: need anything to night? Wine memes distraction, I typed back,
Speaker 1: not yet to morrow, she replied, with a heart. I
Speaker 1: went to the hall closet, found Andrew's battered trail bag
Speaker 1: and emptied the rest of his running gear inside race bibbs,
Speaker 1: half used water bottles, muddy socks he never remembered to clean.
Speaker 1: I zipped it up and set it by the front door.
Speaker 1: I caught a glimpse of myself in the hall mirror,
Speaker 1: eyes swollen hair, a wreck, jaw set and strange. I
Speaker 1: had no idea who this version of me was, or
Speaker 1: who I would need to be for the days ahead. Later,
Speaker 1: as dusk edged the sky, I called my sister in California.
Speaker 1: My voice wobbled as she answered, but she just listened,
Speaker 1: careful not to interrupt as I haltingly described the shape
Speaker 1: of what Andrew had done. When I started to unravel,
Speaker 1: she softly promised to fly out soon, offered shelter in
Speaker 1: whatever way I needed. I hung up, curled on the
Speaker 1: couch with a scratchy blanket, and felt a pocket of
Speaker 1: rage expand and contract in my chest. That night, I
Speaker 1: didn't sleep. Instead, I made a list of every account
Speaker 1: we shared, every bill tied to both names, every calendar
Speaker 1: event that would have to be unspooled, the barbecue, the lease,
Speaker 1: the travel fund marked for winter. I wrote down questions
Speaker 1: for Andrew. When did it stop being possible to tell
Speaker 1: the truth? How easy was it to walk out that
Speaker 1: door and into her world? Morning came with ghostly quiet.
Speaker 1: The house held the stale note of emptied air, a
Speaker 1: party abandoned part way through. I got dressed, moved through
Speaker 1: shallow chores, and left Andrew's trail bag and the box
Speaker 1: of his things by the door. I avoided all the
Speaker 1: rooms I couldn't stomach. When Sabrina texted again, I ignored her,
Speaker 1: not because I was angry, but because I couldn't bear
Speaker 1: kindness just yet. I wanted only silence, needed any clamor
Speaker 1: to fade so I could feel what was really mine again.
Speaker 1: By noon, Mark called, his voice heavy and worn. He's here.
Speaker 1: Nothing you need to do on that front. Let me
Speaker 1: know what you want me to say to the others.
Speaker 1: Just don't protect him, but don't make it a circus,
Speaker 1: he paused. If you need back up for anything, boxes errands,
Speaker 1: drinking until you pass out, call me. I managed a laugh, rusty,
Speaker 1: and hung up. By early afternoon, Sabrina came to the door,
Speaker 1: ignoring my protests, and pressed a grocery bag into my hands.
Speaker 1: Eat or throw it away. I'm not going to let
Speaker 1: you starve because Anne Andrews a bastard. She pulled me
Speaker 1: into a quick, fierce hug, then left, letting the silence
Speaker 1: rebound after her, I went to the back yard, out
Speaker 1: of habit a private act after years of shared evenings
Speaker 1: around the grill. The lights from the last barbecue still
Speaker 1: dangled from the fence, soft filaments, now useless in daylight.
Speaker 1: I pulled them down, methodically, rolling the cord between my fingers,
Speaker 1: and carried them to the garage, Hating the ritual, of
Speaker 1: it inside. I started deleting things from our shared calendar,
Speaker 1: the standing reminder for barbecue, save the date, the label
Speaker 1: we always re used in July, the one I'd set
Speaker 1: up months in advance. Hitting delete was satisfying, final in
Speaker 1: a way conversation could never be. I put the keys
Speaker 1: and Andrew's wallet on the entry table. Their absence from
Speaker 1: my routine both strange and promising. The phone rang again,
Speaker 1: Andrew's mother asking if he'd be by for dinner. I froze,
Speaker 1: unable to speak, I let the voice mail catch her message.
Speaker 1: I knew I'd have to tell her soon, but the
Speaker 1: time was not now. By evening, the house was cleaner, emptier, guilty,
Speaker 1: air scrubbed away. I'd packed away framed photos, wedding travel,
Speaker 1: last year's Halloween in matching flannels in a cardboard box,
Speaker 1: not ready to throw them out, but unwilling to see
Speaker 1: those faces any more. I texted Sabrina my only reply
Speaker 1: of the day, thanks for the food. She didn't write back,
Speaker 1: a small mercy. I processed bills, split our accounts in
Speaker 1: a spreadsheet, drafted a list of possessions, avoided the big topics.
Speaker 1: My mind jittered through contingency plans, Every groove of our
Speaker 1: former ease cut me afresh with how foreign, how impossible
Speaker 1: it now all seemed. That night, as the first real
Speaker 1: quiet returned, I cut the back yard lights for good,
Speaker 1: dropped the broken bulb in the trash, and sat with
Speaker 1: a cup of tea at the patio table. The inside
Speaker 1: of the house turned blue and staticky, the line between
Speaker 1: old and new life suddenly finally entirely real. I stayed
Speaker 1: outside as the last orange of dusk melted away, stubbornly
Speaker 1: clinging to any anchor that felt like mine. I sipped
Speaker 1: tea more for its ritual warmth than taste, and let
Speaker 1: the run down bulbs from the barbecue dangle between my knees,
Speaker 1: slack and fragile. A neighbour's laughter flared up and died again,
Speaker 1: the echo thin through the fence. I hated the thought
Speaker 1: that these sounds would return each summer, while my life,
Speaker 1: this little architecture of trust and habit wouldn't. It took
Speaker 1: me ages to drift through the rooms that evening. Though
Speaker 1: the house wasn't large, the echoes were different now, my
Speaker 1: steps unshadowed, the sound of doors closing final rather than expectant.
Speaker 1: I found myself compulsively wiping the kitchen counter, dusting off
Speaker 1: the spot where Andrew's keys had always landed. Every movement
Speaker 1: led to something of his. A book, a pair of
Speaker 1: socks bawled in the wrong drawer, a battered mug with
Speaker 1: a faded ten K logo. I gathered each object, calmly,
Speaker 1: nearly clinical, and added it to the growing pile by
Speaker 1: the door. At first I thought this work would exhaust
Speaker 1: the sadness. But it was just logistics, not relief. Occasionally
Speaker 1: my mind would drift to alternate versions of the past year.
Speaker 1: Times he breezed through this doorway, muddy sneakers clattering, offering
Speaker 1: me inside jokes or plans for next weekend. No matter
Speaker 1: how I turned the images, I kept catching on the
Speaker 1: details I'd missed, the alternate truths running below the surface. Now,
Speaker 1: with every silent minute, those details glared back at me
Speaker 1: too bright, two obvious, sharp edges. I should have seen.
Speaker 1: A text from work blinked in on my phone, quick question,
Speaker 1: no rush. But I didn't open it. I didn't open
Speaker 1: anything that came from the outside world. That night, whatever
Speaker 1: flame had burned between Andrew and me was snuffed, the
Speaker 1: smoke still choking the rooms, but I wasn't ready to
Speaker 1: talk about it, not to colleagues, barely to friends. By midnight,
Speaker 1: I was hungry, but too weary to eat. I stood
Speaker 1: at the fridge, the bright light falling over the cheap rose.
Speaker 1: Sabrina left behind half a carton of eggs, a zip
Speaker 1: bag of limp greens. I poured the wine, careful not
Speaker 1: to spill, tiny control in a world gone lopsided, and
Speaker 1: took it outside, Sitting on the steps as crickets started
Speaker 1: up in the yard. The simple bitter taste kept me company.
Speaker 1: I tried to woo myself into numbness, but what came
Speaker 1: instead was a slow burn. My sleep, when it finally
Speaker 1: claimed me, was fitful, brief, jarring drops into memory, scenes
Speaker 1: Andrew's voice, half apologies, half laughter, visions of hands weaving
Speaker 1: between mine at some old festival, the taste of grilled sausages,
Speaker 1: the way he looked at me in those early years.
Speaker 1: Each moment that surfaced tainted now felt like another betrayal,
Speaker 1: not just his, but that belonging I thought we'd built together.
Speaker 1: The morning after was follow the city's sun rising, sharp
Speaker 1: slicing through the blinds, sparing nothing. I woke to quiet.
Speaker 1: Andrew's absence was heavier than his presence had been, his
Speaker 1: side of the bed perfectly flat, the indentation in the
Speaker 1: pillow gone. I stretched across the entire mattress, first to
Speaker 1: reclaim it. Then, because there was no one to see
Speaker 1: me collapse into the emptiness, I put on fresh clothes,
Speaker 1: made strong coffee, and willed myself into action. Part of
Speaker 1: me wanted to crawl back into bed and vanish. The
Speaker 1: other part, stubborn and taut, forced me upright toward whatever
Speaker 1: came next. The door bell startled me. I almost didn't answer,
Speaker 1: assuming it was another delivery for Andrew, some bit of
Speaker 1: running gear he'd forgotten to reroot. But it was Mark,
Speaker 1: hands in his pockets, expression careful. I'll keep it short,
Speaker 1: he said, voice low. He wanted to come by for
Speaker 1: some stuff. Told him no for to day. I wanted
Speaker 1: you to know that I nodded, unable to find any gratitude.
Speaker 1: I wanted him gone. Wanted all the evidence of the
Speaker 1: couple we'd been to be erased, the elaborate web of
Speaker 1: friendships and obligations untied. But I recognized Mark's awkward gentleness
Speaker 1: for what it was, a kind of battered loyalty split
Speaker 1: down the middle. Thanks was all I could manage. He shifted, uneasy.
Speaker 1: Whatever you need, just tell us Sabrina's making noise about
Speaker 1: a girl's wine night. But I figure he trailed off,
Speaker 1: letting me fill in the silence with my own refusals.
Speaker 1: I appreciated it more than I could say, just not yet,
Speaker 1: I'm not good company. When he left, I found myself
Speaker 1: clinging to petty tasks, re arranging the mugs, tossing Andrew's
Speaker 1: spare laces into the trash. A sheet of his half
Speaker 1: finished design sketches pequed from under a book on the
Speaker 1: dining table. I considered throwing it away, but couldn't bring
Speaker 1: myself to do it, so I slid it into a
Speaker 1: drawer and slammed it shut harder than necessary. Time seemed
Speaker 1: to stretch and collapse. Even the air felt strange, charged
Speaker 1: and different, as if something else entirely had entered the
Speaker 1: room in Andrew's absence. The house was mine now, if
Speaker 1: only in pain and memory. I kept circling the same questions,
Speaker 1: not really looking for a new answer, just poking at
Speaker 1: the wounds to see which one still bled. After lunch,
Speaker 1: cold salad, a slice of bread I didn't taste. I
Speaker 1: sat with the calendar app open again, scrolling through what
Speaker 1: my years should have looked like. There were reminders set
Speaker 1: for travel. Andrew and I would never take a week
Speaker 1: end in Santa Fe a friend's wedding. Andrew had R
Speaker 1: S v P D yes for months in advance, pieces
Speaker 1: of a shared future hanging useless. Now. I went through
Speaker 1: deleting our joint reminders one by one, stealing myself each time,
Speaker 1: until only the routines I could claim as mine stood untouched.
Speaker 1: By late afternoon, Sabrina called, but this time I answered
Speaker 1: the ape of wanting company, finally overcoming my shame, come over,
Speaker 1: I said before she could offer, but not to talk
Speaker 1: about him, Just to bring stupid movies. Okay. She arrived
Speaker 1: just after dusk. We didn't discuss what happened, not really.
Speaker 1: We watched a bad comedy, drank the rest of her versay,
Speaker 1: and discussed the state of her herb garden. I was
Speaker 1: grateful for her effortless chatter. It hollowed out a space
Speaker 1: for me to just be without analyzing or apologizing. After
Speaker 1: she left, I realized I hadn't checked my phone for hours.
Speaker 1: That in itself was its own kind of progress, or
Speaker 1: at least a way to keep from drowning. That night,
Speaker 1: I started going through the remaining evidence left by Andrew,
Speaker 1: a notepad with scribbled workouts and on one page a
Speaker 1: neat packing list for a retreat, with Sophie's name at
Speaker 1: the top. Don't forget her French press. It was such
Speaker 1: an ordinary, thoughtless intimacy that my breath caught. I resisted
Speaker 1: the urge to text him, resisted the temptation to ask
Speaker 1: for one more reason, one more unearned apology. Instead, I
Speaker 1: gathered all the notes, the trail maps, the punch cards,
Speaker 1: and race bibbs tied to weak ends he'd lied to me,
Speaker 1: and stuffed them into a paper bag, folding it closed
Speaker 1: with finality. I left it by the door for him
Speaker 1: to collect. That was the only closure I could stomach.
Speaker 1: I drafted a short message for Andrew, typing and deleting
Speaker 1: half a dozen versions before settling on. Your things are
Speaker 1: in the entry. Let me know a time and I'll
Speaker 1: make sure i'm out. Spare keys under the mat for now.
Speaker 1: Please don't leave anything behind, he replied hours later. Thanks,
Speaker 1: I'll come to morrow late. I'm sorry for everything I
Speaker 1: didn't answer. There wasn't a reply that could possibly fit
Speaker 1: any more. The sleep I got that night was the
Speaker 1: dreamless kind, heavy with exhaustion, not healing, but at least
Speaker 1: absent of images that could twist the knife deeper. The
Speaker 1: next time morning, I went for a long walk, looping
Speaker 1: the city, headphones in the world on mute. When I
Speaker 1: got home, Andrew's bag was gone. The house was as
Speaker 1: empty of him as I could reasonably make it. By lunch,
Speaker 1: I'd started sorting through bank details, pulling up records for
Speaker 1: the joint account we'd barely touched. I called customer service,
Speaker 1: split the household funds, changed passwords. Another practical step, another
Speaker 1: nail in the coffin of what we'd built together. Each
Speaker 1: system I unwound made the situation feel both more real
Speaker 1: and more manageable. I sat for a long time after,
Speaker 1: fingers still hovering above the keyboard. There was nothing dramatic
Speaker 1: left to rip open, no new secret to confront, just
Speaker 1: a long series of dull, concrete steps, all of them
Speaker 1: pointing toward a future with only one steady presence me.
Speaker 1: A few hours later, I called Andrew's parents, voice measured,
Speaker 1: I told them simply that Andrew had moved out. And
Speaker 1: that we would not be hosting dinner for a while.
Speaker 1: They asked a few gentle questions, nothing invasive. I said
Speaker 1: I need some space and left it there. Comfortable silences
Speaker 1: are a myth. Every pause was a scream of what
Speaker 1: I wasn't explaining. With that done, I returned once more
Speaker 1: to the artifacts in the living room. The pile of
Speaker 1: running magazines, the stash of medals, a box of old
Speaker 1: party decorations. They were just things, stripped of their meaning,
Speaker 1: but it was hard not to see phantoms in everything
Speaker 1: left behind. I bagged most of it to give away.
Speaker 1: I felt a small, unfamiliar pride as I worked, knowing
Speaker 1: that at least here I could make a single, simple
Speaker 1: decision and trust it. Night came with a still hush.
Speaker 1: The neighbor's kids played in the yard. Some one set
Speaker 1: off a firework down the block, the pop and fizz
Speaker 1: shattering the quiet. I stood at the window, watching the
Speaker 1: light fade. Finally, I let myself open the group text
Speaker 1: with Mark and Sabrina, scrolling up to one photo from
Speaker 1: last year's barbecue, Andrew by arms slung around my shoulder.
Speaker 1: My face looked so young, so unworried. I deleted it.
Speaker 1: From my phone. There was nothing in the pixels to save.
Speaker 1: I cleared the last few dishes, shut the windows, and
Speaker 1: drew the curtains. The house, fully closed to the night,
Speaker 1: felt suddenly new possibility, edged by heartbreak. I went to
Speaker 1: the back porch with a mug of tea. The sky
Speaker 1: drained of color, Cicada's thrumbing steady and unbroken. The cold
Speaker 1: was bracing, but I stayed outside, breathing in the air,
Speaker 1: feeling its sharpness crack the shell of numbness left around
Speaker 1: my heart. For a long time, I simply watched the
Speaker 1: city behind our fences spun on, uncaring. Resilient laughter rose
Speaker 1: over someone's deck, a familiar, sweet wound. I let myself cry, unguarded,
Speaker 1: the tears, hot and brief, grateful for Dusk's anonymity. When
Speaker 1: I was finally still, I opened the calendar once more.
Speaker 1: Thumb poised over the old barbecue event. I pressed delete,
Speaker 1: and as the date vanished, space opened up in front
Speaker 1: of me. I sat there for a few minutes longer,
Speaker 1: watching the lights in neighboring windows wink on and off,
Speaker 1: before drawing one last deep breath and turning inside the
Speaker 1: truth of my empty, silent house. Finally, quietly, my own