Speaker 1: Thursday nights always begin with the persistent scent of warm
oil and cresping tortillas off food truck nor it is
hunched over the sidewalk beneath the halogen city lamp. The
Chris Portland air already thick with the promise of rain
and tonight, just like last week, I'm elbowed deep in
a plastic tub of house made salsa when Amy's phone,
her personal cell, the one with the chip lavender caisse
and the screen always black on the counter, buzzes against
the truck's window shelf. She doesn't look at me when
she answers, doesn't even tipper chin my way. There's a
tiny beat of silence after she says Hi, Yeah, I'll
head out soon, and then the phone snapshut with an
efficiency that punches out any chance for a follow up.
Her apron stain in three distinct places, old pico de gallo,
some tomatillow green across the hem, and what might have
been the shadow of chilli oil if she hadn't wiped it.
I'm still rinsing my hands off when she enties it
with quick, nervous fingers, I'll do the supplier run. Amy
calls over her shoulder, the april drizzle already dotting her hairs,
steps backward out of the truck's back hatch, just the
usual Thursday pick up. I'll be home before nine. Want
anything for dinner? Maybe Raymond. She's not quite making eye contact,
busy gathering stray cor keys and keeping her gaze carefully
fixing the neon puddle of city street outside the food truck.
Register is still open, bills peeking out over the rim,
but she doesn't touch it, her walls already stuffed into
her purse or phone cradled in her palm. For a second,
I think task wont to split, need help with the
heavy stuff, But the question dies somewhere in my throat
before supplier runs rour little adventure. I stood for sidewalks,
half awake at seven a m cradling Cheat gas station
coffee and arguing about the best moll vendors in the city. Before.
I always knew which farms she was headed to, who
should see on a given day, which backdoor to look
for on a sunlit warehouse to night, though there's no
mention of where she's going, no order sheets taped to
her phone case, no delivery van Idling at the courb
She simply slides into her weather creased hand to civic,
the one with the faded eat local window decal, and
makes her ride out of the lot. The red glow
of her tay light shutters and the rainsmeared street and batish.
I wipe down the counters in silence, fingers sticky with
dried cilanterer. By the time I finished stacking sauce containers
and lugging the spent drum of Friar agrees to the alley.
I expect her to call to say she's running late
or she needs help with cases. When my own phone
buzzes Eddy fifteen, it's only a push notification from our
share calendar, pracked tammels for Friday mart. She comes in
just before nine cheeks, too rare for her usual draft,
hair rumpled at the crown as if some one else's
hands have been at her scalp. There's not a single
new box under her arm, no crates or plastic bag
stuff of produce, not even a waxy wax paper sleeve
from a bakery. She's in the same genes but changed out.
How works shureffeur of black sweater, her scent heads before
she scissoror not the almond tang of dish soap, not
sweat or chaput lay or anything warm, but something syrupy
and sharp, sweet, almost floral, but darker underneath, like Hannie
with a strange musky dip. The cut with a trace
of Cologni. Can't blaze. She drapes her coat over a
chair before I can say anything. Everything's sorted. They'll invoice us.
I swallow hard, No deliver is to day. She tosses
her hair too quickly. Supplio was backed up. I just
handled paperwork. We'll get the boxes dropped off tomorrow later.
When I crawl into bout, that sun is so strong
it crowds out everything, freud, sheets, even sleep. But by
morning her side is cold. Before all this, things felt
simple for maybe two years, Treat. It was just me
and Emmy, side by side under the humming florescence of
our borer kitchen, the two of us stitching our lives
together through the shared rhythms of flyer heat and coffee fumes.
She always set the playlist Datis Coumbia's and Indy Folk,
and for a few hours each morning, with the city
baily waking, it felt like we were sealed inside our
unwarm world. Onion peels stuck to her elbows. She wink
at me across the prep table and maff the course
to some sun I had forgotten, and the only future
we really needed was the next order's slip. Running nort
was supposed to be all about togetherness, about partners, and
something that was ours. Every milestone we celebrated our first
glowing yelper view, a little friend clipping from the magazine's
bread meant another market that this was real, that we
were eagles. Amy wore blue nail polish the week we
bought our second fry and left smudges of it on
every ledge, a page we filled out the seat. We
had a rhythm for bookwork. One of us would start
the tally, the other would check the math, and in
the offires we'd share greasy styropham takeout in the living room,
half watching whatever show happened to be on. Our trust
was the whole backbone, everything in the open, all calls
and texts and schedules in a single Google calendar. If
something came up, we both heard about it. We both
showed up. If one of us closed out late, the
other came no matter how cold the street of how
long the line? So when Amy announced out of nowhere
late one Wednesday night that Thursday Runs would be hers alone,
I should have said something stronger. She'd pulled the notebook
from under her pillow, flipping past a mess of scribbled
recipes and cost notes. I'm just going to take care
of Thursdays on my own. The drafts long, and they
only want to work with me. Less confusion that way.
I couldn't wrap my head around it. Not after three
years of splitting runs. I half laughed. Since when does
Jalisco Foods or whoever not want more business? It's not Jaliscoe.
It's a new supplier, no further detail. She tucked a
col behind her ear. A habit she only does win
nervous and focused in the watermark in the ceiling plaster.
I can come if you want. I offer as much
out of habit as anything else. She shook her head
too sharp. No, it's easier for everyone if I just
take care of it. Trust me. She started scalling through
her full messages, flicking past faster than I could read
the previews. I caught a flash of looking forward it
before the locks green blinked on after she turned off
a lamp. She kept her phone clutched against her side
beneath the covers. That was the first fracture, the first
time she nudged me out of the kitchen, a little
crack in the tempo of our routine, but I let her.
It was a small ask, and she'd never given me
a reason not to believe her before. The following Thursday
played out almost identically. We wrapped early, lined, dwindling with
the rain. She checked her phone before I even finished
shucking the lost onions. I'm gonna run and grab the
new order, she announced. Keys already in hand. Need a hand,
I asked, more hopeful than anything. She waved a dismissive hand.
I've got it. I'll call if it's anything big. She
didn't make it sound like an invitation. That night, at
just passed nine, she came in wearing an u scoff,
a blue silk one I had never seen before, and
the same strange scent wafted around her. This time. I
watched as she flinched away from my hug, claiming she
was just sticky from all the fruit crates. I checked
the kitchen in the morning. No new honey, no new boxes.
No sign of a delivery. When I asked, she shrugged,
bare faced. They'll bill us. Didn't have to hold anything
to day. Amy's receipts folder for the week was blank.
That's when I noticed her phone habits changing too. She
started tucking her screen away when I'd walk into the room,
a slow shuffle at first, typing with one hand while
spooning sauce with the other. More and more little pings
went off. After midnight, I'd wake up to the pale
blue flash and find her shoulders, hunch face, illuminated by
whatever text bread she kept clothes. One night, while we
lay together, her already curled towards the wall, I heard
her laugh, softly, sharp and private at something honors Green.
I propped myself on one elbow, trying for a casual
what's so funny? She snapped her paone shut, not pausing
for air. Just something for Marissa meme about pickled carrots.
I waited for her to show me, she rolled over instead.
At times it felt like she was erasing me on purpose.
One evening, at a small business mixer with all the
familiar faces from surrounding cats and trucks, she excused herself
made conversation to take a call outside. The room was packed,
everyone shouting recommendations for the best late night dormant spot,
And for a while I just drifted, draw tight from
one clump of people to another, until I caught sight
of her outside coat hunched up, hand pressed tight to
her ear inside A man hovered by the back wall
at all Angele guy whose names sat in the back
of my mind unclaimed. His eyes kept flicking in our direction.
His stance shifting tense, caught my ear. For some reason,
he looked like he was waiting for someone. When Emmy returned,
her face was flushed and she kept her hand woven
through her hair, smoothing flyaways. She avoided the man as
she ducked back in angling her body away from the bar.
We left early that night, me with a headache, how
texting under the dashboard glow all the way home, I
started second guessing everything. I called the regular supplier, Jalisco
Fruits on a Tuesday, just to confirm our next pickup.
Jalisco's manager, Val sounded confused when I asked about off
fires Thursday meetings. We don't do after ires for anyone,
she said. He two always come together in the mornings.
Haven't seen either of you for two weeks. This something
up A question landed like a doll blay. My answer
was a mumbled no, just double checking schedule stuff before
I made up an excuse to hang up. When Amy
came home that night, I asked her straight out, which
supplier have you been meeting Thursdays? I called Jalisco. They
don't do runs after ires, she exhaled loudly, more annoyed
than guilty. It's not Jealuscoe. It's complicated. Look, I'm sorting
it out. Can you just trust me for a minute.
She was already halfway down the hall, not waiting for
a reply. From then on, our intimacy started to slip
away by degrees. In bed, she claimed headaches, exhaustion, or
early morning's always something that let her turn just enough
out of reach. She stopped leaning against me on the couch.
Her hougs at the end of long wek days became perfunctory,
one arm things with a stiffness I didn't recognize. One morning,
rifling through the laundry basket for an apron, I paused
at her lips to extained smudge and the sash. The
red was richer and bolder than anything Amy wore. Her
usual was a pinkish coral or clear gloss, something barely there.
I pinched the cloth between my fingers at syrupy, spicy,
sent rising again, and folded it under her pillow. She
never mentioned it. Sometimes in the truck she laughed too
loudly with certain customers, a bubbling, easy sort of laugh
I had inherit from her in ages at home. She
brightened when a few regulars came by, specially toll men
with easy hands and taste for our fruit based dog
was frescas. Each time she'd smile a little wider, lean
a little closer. If I tried to joke or tease
with her, she clamp up, glancing at her phone, always
acting like she was chasing a schedule. I couldn't see.
As much as I tried, I couldn't get back and
sync with her. It started with little things. No more
splitting up the end of the deposits, no more shared
supply or listape to the fridge, no more scribbled recipe.
T Weeks passed back and forth on napkins or evenings
became parallel lines, each of us scrawling through our own
screens and separate corners of the couch, pretending we couldn't
feel the weight in the air. Once, while turning out
the truck for a deep clean, I came across a
food truck inventory slo it dog eared and frayed at
the edge on the shelf above the register. On the
back in Amy's leapy determined hand was a needying list
of dates, all Thursdays, stretching back about two months. Next
to each was a pair of initials jay W. I
waited until her next early night turned to bring it up.
Holding the slip in my fists, she dumped her keys
in the table. Who's jay W? I tried and failed
to sound casual. Her eyes narrowed for the brief a second,
and then she smoothed her face. Joana Worth, he runs
a beekeeping co op. They do small batch honey. Figured
it could be good for a summer special. Thursday meetings
are just for taste testing. I forgot to mention it before.
But it's no big deal, she watched me, unblinking. You
want to try the honey, I can ask for a sample.
The explanation was half convincing, just enough to loosen the
knot in my chest, But as she shifted the topic
cart to what we should order for dinner. I felt
they need settle right back in her phone pinged again
that night, a little after midnight. When I rolled over
to watch her, she just tipped with her lower lippins
between her teeth, blanketing herself, tied her so I could
only see the glow effected in the window. Every Thursday
bled into the night, each one feeling down near identical
Emmy rushing out with her phone snug in her fist,
coming back with nothing but that syrup sweet musky sent
in her hair in a different scoff old letstickle jacket
each time, never a cart in our invit or any
proof she'd even see in a supply at night. For
a stretch, I tried to top myself down. I forced
as much trust into myself as I could muster. Maybe
she really did have a new order system. Maybe the
honey deal would land as on some Best of Portland
summer list. But then why did all the secrets see,
why no supplier willing to confirm? Why did she keep
so much to herself, and why did her body color
away from mine? More and more until I started feeling
like a gusta my own tiny apartment. The only thing
that kept me saying was work, the threading music of
cutting boards, the familiar lattice of steam and prep routines.
Our clothes and checkers stayed the same, our rotation schedule untouched.
But the center was gone, hollowed out in tender, and
I kept freeplaying every Thursday, like an off Keay song
on a short lip. Every so often Amy would look
up from her phone and for a heart beat seemed
like she might say something, some confessional, some reason that
would make it all of it. But the moment all
slipt away, replaced by a hustle for the door, or
Hannahl ready on her keys, her eyes getting past me,
like I'd become just another part of the background. It
was a kind of slow suffocation. The more evidence I gather,
the less certain I felt. Was I inventing all of this?
Was it possible for someone to love you and look
right for you at the same time. One Thursday, at
the tail end of May, when the sky smeared dis
slate gray at six and never ladened again, I finished
clean up alone. Amy was gone before I'd finished refilling
the hot saucepins. She texted, running late with the supplier
lovey you, but nothing else. That night, I lay in bed,
counting the whirrs of the heater, searching for the scent
of honey on her pillow. It was there, just faint
enough to make me angry, a trace of something sticky,
sweet and not at all irons. By then, even our
regulars had noticed a shift War's amy to day. They'd
ask when she'd vanished from her end of the line,
or eatwo fighting if we weren't joking the way we
used to while hustling out orders, I'd make excuses she's
sorting some new vendor stuff or just slammed with books.
They'd nod, but their eyes lingered and convince. I scrolled
through our shared callander, obsessively looking for clues an unloped meeting,
a cryptic shorthand anything that would pin down what she
was actually doing. But the entries were always vague. There
as they pick up meet jay, w or to honey,
test batch, confirm at bar. At first, the word bar
flickered by and I ignored it, assuming it was a
miskey someone's rushed typo, a casual venue for supplying meet ups.
But the more I thought about it, the more it
gnawed at me. Why a bar for ingredients? Every supply
of meeting we'd ever had was at a warehouse, a cafe,
maybe a marketplace stall. Once I tried to bring up
testing the waters during a low between rushes. Hey, do
you want me to check out that honey you mentioned?
I could meet Jay w next week? She stiffened, hands,
flinching at the lime she was slicing. No, I've got it.
He's picky about who he sells to. I'll pitch you
on it when the time comes. She looked right at me,
her face set and polite, distant patience, the same custom
of service mask she wore with bushy distributors. Stop worrying,
were good. A couple of times I fantasized about just
following her. I pictured myself in the civic shadow, watching
as she drove somewhere out of the city, ducking into
a side door at some industrial park, trading paperwork and
taste test phials with a bearded hippie in overalls. Each
time I told myself it would amount to nothing, that
I was just being paranoid. But then on another Thursday,
layed in June, she came back even later, her face,
shining eyes gussie. Her clothes reeked of the same syrupy,
deep sweet odor, But now there was another layer beneath wine,
maybe as something sharp, floral, almost peppery. I caught a
flush of red lipstick on her neck, smudged to the collarbone.
The next morning, she left her apron drate over her
dining chair. I picked it up, turning over in my hands,
tracing the lipstick mark. I pressed my nose to the cloth,
that strange, sweet, heavy smell, clinging as stubbornly as glue.
I dropped the apron back onto the chair and sat
elbows on knees until my jaw ache from grinding my teeth.
Just then, her phone buzzed from the bedroom, on bright,
insistent chime. Might come to dread. I listened, shoppy Amy
shuffled out, unlocked it, and wandered witlessly into the bathroom,
her voice low and muffled as she answered. She didn't
close the door, just pulled a nearly shut, so all
I heard was a steady, secret murmur of her breath.
For the rest of the day, she avoided me. If
I spoke, she answered in fragments, can you get onions?
A check of friar oil. Everything deflected. That night, as
she stood at the sink, water running too hot over
her hands. I set the apron on the counter beside her,
whose lipstick She flinched barely, then shrugked, sampled new honey.
The supply is wife sell's beauty products on the side.
I tried to shade, got clumsy. She didn't look at
me as she rinsed the plate off and said, it
dripping onto the rack. Don't get weird about it. When
I laid beside her that night, her back was a
ninch father from mine than usual, a cold line of
space stretching between us. If I confronted her, she always
had some patchwork story, a friend's joke, a sales pitch,
a marketing scheme, and it was never clear enough to
pin it down, never soft enough to feel like the
whole truth. Each explanation left out something where she'd really been.
Who she laughed with at two a m. Why no
honey ever showed up? Why I was suddenly supposed to
believe that our life, our business, our partnership was stronger
for shutting me out. Still, I kept trying to catch
her in a slow, our shared world, once so easy
and open had become a fout of half ouncers and
closed doors, and every story password, every late night chuckle
behind a lofted bathroom, every linger and smell that didn't
fit the ordinary sparked another argument inside my chest. Thursday
nights deepened in the ache, accumulating new layers of suspicion.
Each week, the city seemed to conspire with her secrecy.
Shadows longer at the rain, more persistent, street lights dimmer,
my own footsts muffled, as if I was moving deeper
into someone else's story. I started to feel as if
I was the one being erased. I started to feel
as if I was the one being erased. The worst
part wasn't anger. It was drifting Mo's mornings. I'd moved
through our kitchen as if following someone else's choreography, muscle memory,
snapping my body through every routine ye at the center,
at the spark. All the fun and easy rhythm between
us was flattening out into something more like groake choreography
and partnership. It started with the silences, then built into walls.
Thursday crept up the city's silver drizzle, looking every edge,
and I was operating on nothing but habit, prepping mossa humming,
watching the clock more than I should have. At three
forty while before our usual clean up call, Amy was
already shoving her street us back on. All the energy
she used to pour into the counter, cracking jokes, tweaking
spice mixes was gone, replaced by restless glances at her phone. Hey,
I can close up if you want. I tried too soft.
It was just as in a cab for essin hum
around US City, since pouring in the registered drawer was
already ZiT shot. Her apron was white folded, not hanging
like usual. But she didn't answer, just fix something out
of her pose with a practiced little twists and thunder
in a new text, her lips twitching while she waited
for the reply. Finally, she grinned a flush of teeth
she tried to swallow. I found my voice. He's texting,
she stilled. J W, she said flat. He's confirming meeting
at the i'll tap room. Sometimes they keep honey batches
and kegs. More temperature control or something. Anything you want
me to ask. I was pushing it, but needed to
hear something, anything real. She shook her head quickly, forcing
a smell. Naw, I'll do tasting. Note, you just get
home early. I'll bring takeout for a second. She lingered
there in the doorway, neither of us moving. The rain
had let up, her hair still damp against her neck.
She seemed poised to say something. Her gaze flickered to
my mouth, then back to the phone. But whatever it
was she pocketed it, swung out the door, and the
hatch clan shut. Before I knew she was gone. I
watched her out the window, just a shape under a
city lamp, hurrying to the civic I could see the
blue scoff tied loose at her neck. She fiddled with
her phone, laughing, stopped, then called someone. I leaned closer.
The rain twisted her voice into static, but her face, eager, open,
was softer than I'd seen it for weeks. The joy
on her lips was surgical, precise, and it made by
all rise. I stayed cleaning until every inch of the
truck gleamed above the smell of lysol. Too tense to
sit still, too exhausted to fully admit apathetic i'd become.
When I finally trudged home, the window was dark and empty.
I roasted in silence, reapling it all the scarf, the
way she smiled for her phone, the apologetic tilt of
her shoulders as she shut the hatch. I't ate fifty
four ride on time. As always. She came in, cheek
shining and hair pulled up to rough bond. No takeout,
no honey, no conversation. She kissed my forehead automatically and
went straight to the sharer, left alone with her purse
on the table. I have it by it. I shouldn't have,
but I did die and zipped it just enough to peek. Nothing,
no evidence, not even a straynkin or a bottle gilt
prickled inside me, so I zipped it up and stared
at the rainy window instead, feeling small. Friday was supposed
to be our Rosette day we do rarely, bakery pick
up together, then dive into a round of Sausa's and
fried batch testing, low key, arguing over salt. That Friday,
she showed up late, claiming traffic on burn side. She
moved quieter than usual, methodical, and closed off, never once
looking at me except to ask where the new cutting
boards were. I tried to break the ice with a
dumb story about a regular who tried to pay with
vintage baseball cards, but she just nodded, already scraping onion
skins into the compost. Her phone buzzed and she turned
her back to me, shoulders rolling forward, answering and clipped
muffle murmurs. After our shifts, something finally snapped inside me.
We were at the apartment table. Receipts scattered, and I
caught her tracing shades on the margin of a supplier invis.
Were things weird at the suppliers last night? I tried
working hard to keep my voice light. She dropped her pen. Weird, ha,
I mean any reason you didn't bring back anything? Can
I help next week? Or would it be better if
I called ahead made it easier? She pressed her upon
to her forehead. Why are you on this, she snapped,
voice low and trembling. It's not complicated. Some things are
better when only one of us handles them. Trust me.
The words stung more than I cared to admit. We
always did every part together. Just this one thing, please,
I've got it. The finality in her tone scared me
more than anything else. She pocketed the receipts and pushed
back from the table. Off to rinse a mug that
didn't need rensing. The next Thursday, I found reasons to
circle the block as I waited for her nerves a miter,
I told myself, I give her the benefit of the dove,
no spying, just an honest coincidence. If I saw which
way her car went, may be proved my suspicions totally unfounded.
But when she drove off, her window already down, she
made a left, not toward any so flowers we'd ever use,
but toward the river towards Danta. I walked slow and tense,
the city feeling wrung around me. I found myself ducking
past the window of a wine bar set back from
the street, with a sign painted in gold leaf of
the barrel room. A string of yellow bulbs flickered above
the archway, reflected in puddles. I almost laughed, but then
I saw her, Amy laughing, leaning close to her, tall
just ahead, ma'am with broad shoulders. I recognized him at once,
the same guy from the business mixer, the one watching
us like he wanted to say something, the one whose
name took richey Worth. He had his hand on Emmy's elbow,
steering her toward the back. She dipped her head, said
something I couldn't hear, and laugh so brightly it felt weaponized.
The way she looked at him wasn't business like, not
the formal clip patient she did with the vendor. She
looked alive, there, animated, lips, gauwsy. She reached out and
swooped her hand over his shirt, there in public, as
if it was the most natural thing in the world.
He slung his arm over the booth and leaned in,
whispering something in her ear that made her drop her head, grinning.
Even from outside, squinted up against the I could see
the intimacy of the bubble, the closeness, unhurried comfort, A
bottle of wine between them, their glasses half full. At
one point she reached for his wrist and he let
his hand rest there, fingers trailing over her knuckles. It
was a familiarity I hadn't seen from her in months.
When another group came in, laughing too loud, Amy pressed
herself closer to Jonah, as if to close out the
rest of the world. The angle of her hips was
turned inward. The look she gave him was negotiations, It
was affection. It was desire. My stomach twisted so violently
that I nearly lost my balance. I watched for maybe
an hour, rooted there in the wet night, hart jackammering
slow anine. The coal pressed through my jacket, but I
could barely feel that the numbness was all internal. At
the end, as they stood to leaf, his hand slid
around her waist, and she let herself melt into him,
nestling under his arm near the door. Even with street
lights and traffic moving by in waves, I could see
them post just shy if the door were She turned up,
touched his cheek, and he kissed her lawn and gentle,
hang on her jaw, not fast, not furtive, public, affectionate
or mistakable. Only then did I turn and stumble away,
skin tingling, blood loud in my ears. The sound of
my heart was the only thing I could hear all
the way home. I let myself into our apartment on
ort a pilot, everything looking sharper and into her down
jacket over the chair, A single glass in the sink
of the faint sweet musky sent drifting from the bathroom
as if she'd bid in a memory of what I
just witnessed. When she came home on me a bed,
all key. The first thing she did was slip her
shoes off and meet my gaze. There was a glow
to her her hair, loser, eyes shining, Let's kiss clean.
She started to say sorry late night, but I barely
heard the words for the first time. I didn't answer,
then force a smile, didn't suggest we order in a
water show. Instead. I walked past her to the bedroom,
shut the door, and lay there in the darkness, questions
roaring inside my chest. I heard water running in the bathroom,
the hush of her hands as she moved around the kitchen,
moving as if everything was perfectly normal. But none of
it was normal anymore. The secrets had weight now Friday morning,
I couldn't look her in the eye. We prepped in silence,
every knife stroke between us. When customers came, I tried,
at least to act like it was just another day.
Amy slid right into her familiar role, bright, funny, I
p all, quick witted, charm. I wondered how long she'd
been doing this, making me believe the world outside the
truck with still ires. Even as she corved out whole
secret eyres. She was texting more openly now, not even
glancing my way, throm speeding across the keyboard. Once, when
she burst out laughing alone and nothing, I froze petrolmeter.
She caught my eye, tucked her phone face down and
said you should have seen this me Murray's ascent. I
didn't reply. She went back to work. Privately. I started
cataloging her absences every Thursday, new clothes, a new flourished
to her make up, sometimes a faint shimmer I never
seen before. Once I found a receipt from a bakery
near the barrel room to cross us one black coffee,
dated a Thursday morning, not our usual supplier, not in
our neighborhood. When I asked about it, she just shrugged,
dropped by first sample something for next week's bunch menu.
You weren't up yet. Another night, I forgot to close
out our shared laptoup and saw browser taps open to
event spaces. Small wineries were tasting rooms near the East Bank,
all in that same narrow corridor. She became irritable if
asked why. I said it was for promotion, maybe summer partnerships.
No details, only avoidance. I even tried texting her Thursday afternoon,
testing her story it need me to pick anything up
on the supplier run, she replied, instantly, all handled enjoy
a night off. The brittle, sarcastic anger started to work
its way under my skin, Anger at her, at myself,
at my own inertia. How long had I convinced myself
that these scraps of explanations were enough? The last Thursday
before everything broke, she barely bothered with the story. It's
just a late meeting, she said, sliding her best earrings, delicate,
drapped crystal things through her earlopes, checking her reflection. She
wore a shop blazer, something that drew the line of
her shoulders, sleek and deliberate, pared with the faint glimmer
of the same deep red lipstick I'd found smeared on
her apron. I stood in the wholewa keys clutch tight,
pretending to look for change in the dish by the door.
She brushed by, grabbing her purse. So do you want
me to? She cut me off, all business, I said,
I've got it, O K please. She met my gaze
for a moment. Something brittle and bruised in her eyes,
a fracture I had never seen before, And then she
was gone. Footsteps quick against the stairs. When the door shut,
I finally felt the anger cut through the haze of pain.
I had to see for myself, once and for all,
if all this agony came from nothing, or if the
truth was as ugly as it felt. So I waited
five minutes, grabbed my jacket, and headed out into the
sodden blue darkness of July, not even caring if she
saw me. I kept back half a block behind, trailing
the civic as she drove across the city. When she turned,
I kept walking, Every step went tight as piano wire,
praying for her to prove me wrong. But she parked
two blocks from where I'd watched her before. I hung back,
hart panding as she climbed out, straightened her blazer, and
all but glided down the sidewalk to the glowing doorway
of the barrel room. There under the golden bulbs was Joan, awaiting, impatient, nervous,
then brightening with a smile that was far too familiar.
She went straight into his arms, lingering there, both of
them swaying so close it made my hand shake. They
went inside, not looking back. Once I crossed over to
the opposite sidewalk, moving into the cover of a closed
for blo shop, hot pounding with the certainty of everything
I didn't want to admit. I watched them through the window,
two silhouettes at a table in the corner, framed in
light and laughter that looked nothing like business. Their bodies
moved an easy concert, hands touching as meeting had to
tip together in private conversation. They drank wine, the odor
of food to something with tiny, artful garnishes. And I
watched as Jonah lifted a glass to her lips, and
she let him tip it up for her, grinning, careless,
alive about an iro in. I saw her hands lie
behind his neck. He leaned forward, kissed her slow and sure.
She kissed him back as fluttering, closed lips parted. Her
body language was gentle, opened, exactly what I hadn't felt
from her in months. The side hollowed me out, leaving
nothing but a cold verrop it. There was no business angle,
no honey tasting, no supply deal, only her caught in
some one else's orbit. When they finally stood, bundled up
in the drizzle, he draped his jacket over her shoulders,
bent to kiss her again. She turned to say something laughed,
and then they walked away, two heads bowed together under
the blur of city lights. I let them go, crossing
the street slowly, my shoes soaking through. Every certainty I
ever had slipped away, replaced by the ugly final clarity
of what I'd seen. There was no explanation that could
fit this, no joke, no marketing plan, nothing left salvage.
That was the moment I knew bone deep that anything
I'd thought we shared, our partnership or trust, even the
smallest joke, was a lie, hollowed out by her secrets,
by the sharp, musky sweetness that was mine. I let
myself into the apartment quietly, the iching my chest ride
behind me like something heavy and soaking wet. The kitchen
was dark except for the humming blue nightlight above the range,
barely enough to outline the imoshed mugs on the empty
spot where Amy's ibun had draped only iOS before. My
hands shook so badly it took me three tries to
work off my jacket. I pressed my knuckles hard to
my eyebrown and stood in the silent kitchen, barely breathing,
just listening, waiting for her key in the lock, a
sound ad dredded now almost as much as I was
desperate for answers. But the world didn't give me that. Instead,
it gave me the clock ticking to midnight, the steady
ray kneeling, the fire escape, fine stretched, thin and brittle.
As I paced the length of our crumped living room
back and forth, hopping only to jab at the framed
Best of Portlands certificate in the wall, my own face
smiled off from inside that glass, bright and oblivious beside hers.
I eventually landed on the battered arm of the couch,
half crushed by a pile of discarded cook books. It
was iurs before I heard her at the door. First
the hushed forces in the hall, too muffled turned inify,
Then the scrape of her shoes on the mat, the
mut a creak as she came in. She paused in
the entry, keysdrop one at a time, then a muttered
shit his, Her purse tumbled open. She tried to tiptoe,
but there's no way to move quietly in our place.
I sat as still as the furniture, fighting a wave
of nausea. She smelled of wine, and that bright alien
perfumed the one I dress so many times on her collar,
now unmistakably form. Her silhouette drifted quickly to the bathroom door,
left slightly ajar wat a, running the faint rhythm of
her washing her face, as if to erase the evening.
I waited when she emerged. I was still on the couch,
my arms folded tight, every muscle brace for the moment
she'd finally notice what I knew. She tattered across the rug,
startled when she saw me upright, maybe surprised that I
wasn't already asleep. Were just that I saw her at all.
Whurrir uply, she said, forcing cheer. I thought she'd be
asleep by now, I know, I said, my voice barely
more than a croak. She froze midstep, as narrowing let's
parted in some silent shocktough. She must have known what
I meant, but she played her role a second longer,
tucking hair behind her ear, gay skating sideways. Now what
the tremor in her question was small practiced. I leaned forward,
hand shaking. I saw you amy the wine bar with
Joah Worth. I'd never said his name allowed to her before,
had echoed ugly and unreal in the little room. She
didn't respond at first, or maybe she did. Her entire
body let go, crumpling into the arm chair opposite like
she'd been punched. She dug the heels of her hands
into her eyes and breathed out once. I watched her
shoulders quick beneath her thins wetter. Finally, she looked up,
her voice trembling. It wasn't supposed to happen like this.
I couldn't laugh, couldn't cry. How was it supposed to happen? Then?
Was I supposed to just keep her tending? A kind
of keening sound broke from her chest, and she pressed
her fist to her heart, like she was keeping it
from falling out. I never wanted to hurt you. I
swear that, just God. I kept telling myself it would end,
that it was just that was stupid, something small. Then
it wasn't. I snapped louder than I expected. You made
me look like an idiot. The lies of the storers
every Thursday, Helen, She WinCE, chewing her thumb, now raw
months since the winter event. I thought it would wear off,
but every time it felt me. I didn't mean to
push you out. I just I needed to feel wanted again.
I guess like I mattered to some one. The words
stung as much as the facts. So this is my fault,
because you needed something I didn't give. Tears pulled in
her eyes, and this time her voice was so small
I almost missed it. No, no, you were always here, always, daddy.
I don't know what's wrong with me. She sobbed, Hans,
crumpling in her lap. Her entire posture collapsed. I stood,
unable to sit in the same place as her confessions.
My throat burned with rage and heartbreak. In a hollow,
desperate want to rewind everything you could have told me,
I said, but the words fell flap. I thought this
was ire as the truck, this life, was any of
it real? She shook her head fast, as if that
could scatter the mess between us, everything un told. I
didn't want this. I just couldn't stop. Please, I'm sorry,
I'm so so sorry. The air and the apartment into nothing,
the walls closing in around her, heaving breaths and my
stun silence. I stared at her, hurriedly, able to recognize
the person I thought I loved, Unable to find even
the scraps of what we used to be. I wanted
to scream, I wanted to break something, to demand some
kind of sense from her, to make her feel the
weight of what she'd taken. But I only managed I
can't do this. My voice dry's paper. She saw Tarder
curling forward as if she could hide in her own arms.
I watched every muscle shaking until it was clear there
was nothing left to wrench free from the ruins between us.
We sat that way for a long time. I stared
at the wall, her outline blurry at the edges. Every
sound outside, the drip of rain a far off cahorn,
felt louder than the silence swallow in our living room.
After a while, she choked up one last try explanation,
but I was already up, moving around the apartment with
a slow mechanical purpose of some one dismounting their own life.
I pulled my overnight bag from under the bed, packed
without care. My hands moved almost by themselves, crabbing socks
and shirts, my chief brush, a few chargers, the bat
of Denham jacket that still smelled like saucers and friar oil.
I forced myself to breathe through the rush of images
heard at the truck window, laughing her beside me at
the cooked top, fingers crazing mine for a spice jar.
She stayed in the living room, silent, crying softly into
her hands. She didn't follow. I zipped the bag and
slung it over my shoulder. The apartment felt airless, everything
tinged with the sweetness I'd grown to hate. I left
my set of keys on the edge of the kitchen counter,
next to the open food truck calendar, our shared world
left behind in less columns and digital reminders. My phone buzzed,
and I thumbed out a brief, flat message to r J,
the only friend we shared, barely reading my own words.
Not come into the truck tomorrow. Tell Amy to handle prep.
R J would not ask questions, Not yet. I stepped
into my shoes by the door, hands trembling as I
tied the laces. I looked back once toward deliving re
MIMMI slumped in the arm chair, knees up, gaze on nothing.
The distance between us was wide and final. I stepped
into the whole, lightly shutting the door behind me with
a soft hull click. The corridor was dim, the carpet
rough under my feet, lights humming. I walked slow, not
looking back. I took the stairs down to the sidewalk,
rein tapping my shoulders, the bag heavy. I stood there,
half lit by the knee on a twenty four irour laundromat,
breathing fog into the night, feeling the press of everything
lost bearing down through the soles of my shoes. I
looked once at the food truck park down the street,
its bright pain dullt by door mist as stick could
not logo, shadowed on the rain un krom. The windows
were dark, the city soft around the edges, and for
the first time, it felt entirely air, as a closed
up frylock of something I once believed was unbreakable. The
wall felt shaky and too sharp, but I knew exactly
what was real and what wasn't. I found an empty
spot byder cub, set my back down and let my
breath catch in the chill. The city moved on around me,
indifferent and shining. I watched the skylighton new day, edging
over the silent truck, and for a long moment I
just stood there, knowing that the one thing I counted
on was only ever partly true. Eventually, the early city
traffic started rumbling past the corner, headlights cutting trails through
the mist. I already surging back into motion, as if
nothing at all had shifted. I stood nom my hands
red and tingling from the coal, watching every figure who
passed with the kind of distant, exhausted wonder how easily
everyone else moved forward, how freely they entered vickers, checked
their phones, unlocked bikes. Every one but me. I couldn't
make sense of the stillness I'd left behind, the apartment,
the truck, the shared rituals that had scaffolded every day
under the frattured belly of dawn. Nothing tethered me except
the way to my throat in the hot, dull eke
along my temples. I tried to calculate what happened now
in the world. Would Amy shut down the truck for
the day, or pretend push on past it, scrub my
name off the payrolls, and let the city crowd by
the window without knowing what had chatted behind the counter?
Would she telled JO and I had found out? Did
she even need to or had she already planned for
this part? The extracting, the sudden subtraction of our life?
I pressed my palm into my eyes, dragging it down
my face. Feeling more tired than I could remember ever
being nothing, felt ready to move forward, yet standing here
was impossible, and going anywhere else made even less sense.
The truck was silent. Es shell My pockets as I
checked them out of habit held nothing but my phone
and a crumpled receipt time stamp from two days ago
at a corner cafe when everything had still felt salvageable.
I flapd my foe out, checked the home screen for
any new messages. Nothing from Amy, nothing from RJ. Just
a single and read email from the supplier asking about
imbossing on honeyed it never existed. That thought made me
shudder with something almost close to laughter. Clipped moraw honey,
all that theater, all those storers, and for what I'd
believe them, because I'd wanted to, needed to, because letting
suspicion and meant risking the loss that now sat so
clearly in my hands. Through the rising light, I could
see the truck's window, stick of peeling at the corners,
the faint handprints where we both pressed for warmth on
Colt nights. A single to go cup stood abandoned on
the ledge of regulars, maybe or Amy's yesterday afternoon rimstained
faintly with lipstick, the ron shay. I let my gaze
graze over all of it, every small detail that yesterday
would have meant the longing, but now only echoed the
pointlessness of holding on. Time moved strange in the streets,
stuttering pass then slowing. While I stood there, my shoulders
ate under the bag, so I shifted position, looking up
into the gray blue above. Someone out walking a dog
pulse to nod, offered a brief smile. I tried to
nod back, but I think it came out twisted and practiced.
The dog sniffed my shoes, then wandered away, tail swinging,
and its owner never looked back. For too long, I hovered,
body lost between instinct and attention. I ran to useless logistics,
where to go, who to call, whether I even wanted
to eat. Every moment in my mind shadowed by what
waited up in that apartment. The calendar still opened to
our shared plans, the old photos in the fridge, Amy's
figure hunch small in that battered unche Was she still crying?
Was she already texting him? Did she want me to
come back, or was it relief that I'd finally made
the hard part easy. I wondered if she would try
to call me, maybe send some last message of comfort
or explanation, But my fun stayed silent. The world wanted
nothing from me. Now set to move, an ambulance wailed
somewhay close a bus drack that breaks two blocks down,
letting off a herd of commuters and khaki and headphones, sunlight,
And I threw a rent in the clouds, hitting the
crumb of a passing car so hard it made my
eye water. The food truck, two car lance away, caught
the life for a second, a goal, then dull, then
only itself again, just a battered empty box. I pulled
my cook closer, shivering a little now as the adrenaline
sank into something colder, empty. Every cell in my body
wanted to go back, to have one last argument, to
demand a different story, to erase everything that had just happened,
and force Amy back into honesty by sheer wool. But
there was nothing left to fight for. She'd made her
choice and forced the truth into light. No matter how
I replayed in my mind what I could have done
what I should have pushed for, when I should have
us repressed, or trusted less, or trusted more. None of
it changed that final and deniable reality. I shifted my
grip on the bag, pulling up the strap where it
bit into my palm. Movement was all that was left
for a long, stretched heartbeat. I looked down at my
shoe stamps streaked with city grime, one lace fray neantly
through and then back up the block toward the avenue,
with the noise of the city that caned into something
that sounded enough like normal life to be bearable. Amy
somewhere overhead was working in a new future without me.
R J reply finally buzzed in, just reword shee okay man,
and nothing else. I let the screen go dark without answering.
I wanted to look back, but forced myself not to
forward across the drainage puddles into the quiet throb of traffic,
away from the old world shape I shared labor and
the fiction of trust. The morning pressed wet against my
cheeks as I walked first heel, then tow each step,
separating me finally from everything we'd colled iris. The city
stretched open in front of me, new and hollow, cold
and pray, and I blended into it, just another face
letting go.