Speaker 1: The risotto was perfect. This time. I'd finally taken Meggan's
Speaker 1: advice about the white wine, letting it reduce until the
Speaker 1: rice was glossy the way Ben liked it, a little
Speaker 1: awl dent shavings of home made parmesan melting in the steam.
Speaker 1: It was nearly seven fifteen. He was usually home by
Speaker 1: seven thirty on Wednesdays, the only week day he didn't
Speaker 1: have some industry mixer, urgent late client tour, or random
Speaker 1: pop up open house. I set the table, flicked off
Speaker 1: the overheads, and left only the lamp on. Maybe a
Speaker 1: touch dramatic, but I had wanted to night to feel different.
Speaker 1: Warm a reset, My phone vibrated a double buzz. The
Speaker 1: screen lit up with Ben's name and a half preview.
Speaker 1: Running club went long, doing extra lap solo. Don't wait
Speaker 1: up o K, I typed back, adding a little shoe emoji,
Speaker 1: as if being undermanding could make me feel less alone.
Speaker 1: I didn't want to be that wife, checking and double
Speaker 1: checking every plan. I was the one who practically begged
Speaker 1: him to go to running club in the first place.
Speaker 1: You need a non work stressed drain and maybe some
Speaker 1: vitamin D, he'd grinned. Messily handsome, tying a neon green
Speaker 1: band around his messy hair, trying not to fall apart
Speaker 1: on you in your thirties, babe, he joked. Now, as
Speaker 1: the steam from the rice faded, I told myself, he's motivated,
Speaker 1: he's happy. That should be enough. By eight, I moved
Speaker 1: the risotto into a tupperware and stacked the plates. Our
Speaker 1: apartment was tidy, the good kind of quiet, minimalist light
Speaker 1: wood and gentle grays, with bens sneakers somehow always visible
Speaker 1: by the door, no matter how often I tucked them away.
Speaker 1: I was still in work leggings and a sweater, my
Speaker 1: hair twisted into a messy bun, half falling out. When
Speaker 1: did I stop changing before dinner? I almost laughed at myself.
Speaker 1: I opened my map app. Not because I want to
Speaker 1: track him, I told myself, But I just didn't get it.
Speaker 1: The main park loop was four kilometers even two laps
Speaker 1: warm up, cool down. It shouldn't take two hours, right,
Speaker 1: Maybe there were hills I didn't know about. Did runners
Speaker 1: stop to socialize, trade stories about shoes and it bands.
Speaker 1: I had this sudden image of Ben as a new,
Speaker 1: chattier version of himself. High on indorphins, talking pace splits
Speaker 1: with people I'd never met. The minutes stretched, I opened
Speaker 1: a bottle of wine, poured half a glass out of
Speaker 1: habit I scrolled Instagram. That was how most evenings went now,
Speaker 1: painting with Spotify in the background, notifications with Megan, and
Speaker 1: snippets of work emails, and the ambient hush of our place,
Speaker 1: waiting for Ben to come home. At eight forty two,
Speaker 1: a notification popped up. Hey saw Ben at the park.
Speaker 1: Didn't know you were into running now, Megan? Of course,
Speaker 1: I almost replied with a joke about how the only
Speaker 1: thing I was running was late on deadlines, but I
Speaker 1: stopped myself. The message felt out of place, like I'd
Speaker 1: missed something. I double checked the park she meant. Tapping
Speaker 1: into her story, Megan's boomerang showed a group of runners
Speaker 1: mid stretch, bodies blurring in low light. My thumb hovered
Speaker 1: over reply. Surely Ben would have told me she was there,
Speaker 1: right Or did he not see her? Or was he
Speaker 1: just so busy making running friends he didn't notice. I
Speaker 1: shut off my phone, stared at the dark window. The
Speaker 1: risotto now a cool, starchy brick. I couldn't pimpunt it exactly,
Speaker 1: but the air in the apartment felt thinner. I wanted
Speaker 1: to shake it off. It wasn't jealousy. I wasn't that cliche.
Speaker 1: I just wanted to understand what he got from all
Speaker 1: those laps that he couldn't get from me. When Ben
Speaker 1: finally came home after ten, sweaty and flushed, he dropped
Speaker 1: his duffel by the door. His voice was too bright,
Speaker 1: slightly keyed up, like he'd had won too many espressos. Sorry, babe,
Speaker 1: crazy long night. You didn't wait, did you? Of course not,
Speaker 1: I lied, ushering him toward the shower, acting busy. He grinned,
Speaker 1: ducking to kiss me. Cheeks scratchy with stubble, rosier than usual.
Speaker 1: I'll tell you all about it, he promised, but his
Speaker 1: eyes were already half closed the hot water hissing from
Speaker 1: the other room. I listened for the snap of the
Speaker 1: shampoo bottle, the creak of pipes, and wondered why I
Speaker 1: suddenly felt I was missing something crucial. It wasn't until
Speaker 1: I started washing up that I realized I'd left his
Speaker 1: bowl in the microwave. I took out the plastic container,
Speaker 1: feeling ridiculous for how carefully I'd saved it, as if
Speaker 1: a warm meal could anchor us in some way. That night,
Speaker 1: I lay in bed, watching the blue glow of Ben's
Speaker 1: phone as he scrolled through emails or maybe Strava. He
Speaker 1: seemed physically present, arm draped across my waist, but a
Speaker 1: step removed, lost in motion. Even as he lay still,
Speaker 1: That sense of something cooling between us went unnamed. Maybe
Speaker 1: some part of me was afraid to even think about
Speaker 1: it clearly, the way you try not to jinx good
Speaker 1: luck by calling it aloud. The weeks before the Running
Speaker 1: Club were ordinary in all the ways that matter. We
Speaker 1: had routines, Sundays at Ledger Cafe working on the slowly
Speaker 1: in progress kitchen, back Splash, Friday wine and take out
Speaker 1: nights with a different group of friends each time. Ben's
Speaker 1: career in real estate was always swinging between hyperactive and dead.
Speaker 1: He thrived during the former, moaned and started pet projects
Speaker 1: during the latter. I liked his ambition, his unpredictability, the
Speaker 1: way he'd text me mid afternoon, what if we finally
Speaker 1: put up that gallery wall and then actually do it?
Speaker 1: Skipping dinner and sleeping under a mess of drop cloths.
Speaker 1: I met Ben five and a half years ago at
Speaker 1: an art gallery opening downtown. He was there with Paul
Speaker 1: networking for business more than the art, but he spent
Speaker 1: half an hour analyzing color swatches with me. Anyway. He
Speaker 1: asked about the sh shade of cerulean on one abstract
Speaker 1: canvas and told me he pictured it on our living
Speaker 1: room walls, not yet knowing we'd live together or that
Speaker 1: I'd paint it myself. Years later, after a tough freelancing
Speaker 1: month when we couldn't afford real art, what drew me
Speaker 1: in was that he could talk to anyone, make a
Speaker 1: joke out of the ordinary, pull me out of my
Speaker 1: own head long enough to see something new. We balanced out.
Speaker 1: I brought lists, plans, a way of organizing chaos. He
Speaker 1: brought momentum. On a good weekend, we felt like a
Speaker 1: team planning huge, slightly impossible projects, back yard garden beds.
Speaker 1: We didn't of space for a road trip over the Rockies.
Speaker 1: Never took it. A YouTube DIY channel also never happened.
Speaker 1: When the recession hit two years ago, we hunkered down.
Speaker 1: Ben lost a huge commission, I lost my two best
Speaker 1: design clients. We bickered about spending, then devised restaurant night
Speaker 1: at home. He went back to small deals and corporate rentals.
Speaker 1: I took on odd, unglamorous branding gigs. We rode it
Speaker 1: out clothes, sometimes a little desperate, but trusting, not flashy,
Speaker 1: not t V romantic, our version of resilience. If there
Speaker 1: was a pattern to our rare arguments, it was always
Speaker 1: about Ben's hours. He worked best. Late claimed he needed
Speaker 1: odd social settings to hustle for the next big client.
Speaker 1: I used to roll my eyes, but in five years
Speaker 1: nothing ever remotely tested his fidelity. If anything, people would
Speaker 1: joke about how annoyingly present we were at events. Ben
Speaker 1: liked attention, but he always came home. We agreed no
Speaker 1: kids yet, may be never. Our families, both just outside
Speaker 1: the city, were supportive, sometimes nosy, but generally content if
Speaker 1: we seemed happy. Our new place was supposed to be
Speaker 1: a reboot after last year's stress, with more light, clean lines,
Speaker 1: less pressure to be up and coming. It was the
Speaker 1: most grown up thing we'd done, signing the lease, spending
Speaker 1: weekends assembling ika cabinets until we nearly murdered each other
Speaker 1: with an Allen wrench. At some point Ben's stress shifted.
Speaker 1: He stopped talking so much about money and started bringing
Speaker 1: up burnout, how he didn't want to wake up one
Speaker 1: day having missed life itself. I was proud of him
Speaker 1: for naming it out loud. That's why I had nudged
Speaker 1: him when I saw the flier for the running club,
Speaker 1: joking that a little sweat, a little son few, as
Speaker 1: Zillow alerts, what's not to love? He'd laughed off the
Speaker 1: idea at first, you want to date a marathoner or
Speaker 1: a fun dad bod realtor. But the next week he
Speaker 1: signed up. Maybe that's why it strung just a little
Speaker 1: to feel pushed out now that he actually liked it.
Speaker 1: The next Wednesday, I decided not to spend the evening
Speaker 1: alone again. I was loading the dish washer when Ben
Speaker 1: called from the bedroom, getting ready for his run. Hey,
Speaker 1: I called, What if I come by the club to night.
Speaker 1: I can cheer you on, embarrass you with a sign,
Speaker 1: maybe bribe you with coffee after. I want to see
Speaker 1: this new runner in action. He popped his head around
Speaker 1: the corner, towels slung around his neck. Almost too quick,
Speaker 1: or babe, trust me, it's like watching grass grow. You'd
Speaker 1: be bored out of your mind. Just sweaty people shuffling
Speaker 1: in silence, I'll fill you in after promise. Plus we
Speaker 1: usually cool down by splitting up for solo intervals. Club rules, oh,
Speaker 1: I said, trying to keep it light well, sounds intense.
Speaker 1: He grinned. It's more boring than it sounds. I swear.
Speaker 1: But thanks for the support, I shrugged, feeling a weird,
Speaker 1: almost adolescent twinge of rejection. We'd always been good at
Speaker 1: supporting each other's side hobbies, even when they were ridiculous.
Speaker 1: The year I took up advanced origami, his flirtation with
Speaker 1: bread baking. Now with running, he seemed territorial. After he left,
Speaker 1: I gathered up his running gear. There was a new
Speaker 1: technical shirt in the laundry, a sleek, expensive brand, tags
Speaker 1: only recently snipped. It wasn't familiar. I didn't remember buying
Speaker 1: it for him. He dee never mentioned new gear. For
Speaker 1: a stupid second. I sniffed it as if that would
Speaker 1: mean something. It just smelled like laundry. Probably nothing. Still,
Speaker 1: a left over unease clung to me. Ben had never
Speaker 1: been a treat yourself person, unless it was gear for
Speaker 1: his outdoor projects. New shirts fell into them. Mention it
Speaker 1: and I'll buy it after three months of hesitation category
Speaker 1: maybe he bought it for himself, this time inspired by
Speaker 1: the club. Maybe someone in the club gave it as
Speaker 1: a welcome gesture. Maybe stop. It's not a crime to
Speaker 1: have new interests or new clothes. When he came back late,
Speaker 1: freshly showered, I tried for casual good run. He put
Speaker 1: his feet up on the coffee table, sipping his recovery smoothie. Yeah,
Speaker 1: full loop hit a new pace, nothing fancy, same old.
Speaker 1: I tried any one interesting show up? He shrugged. Mostly
Speaker 1: the regulars. Lisa's killing it as usual, she's the club organizer.
Speaker 1: But you get the usual ross flexing gear, people obsessed
Speaker 1: with their g p s, watches, nothing you'd want to
Speaker 1: sit through. His voice had the same too generic quality
Speaker 1: as last time, a focus on stats and the root,
Speaker 1: not people, not stories. Later, as we lay in bed,
Speaker 1: he rolled away a little earlier than usual, mumbling exhausted babe.
Speaker 1: Early day to morrow. I stared at his back in
Speaker 1: the low light, trying to decide if I was overthinking
Speaker 1: his tiredness. Was it me, was it the running, the work?
Speaker 1: Something else? Entirely, I told myself, maybe it's normal for
Speaker 1: us to have lulls. Maybe this was just mid thirty's realism,
Speaker 1: not a warning sign. Still, my hand lingered near his
Speaker 1: side for a moment longer than usual, before I let
Speaker 1: myself drift. On Sunday, I decided to see what all
Speaker 1: the fuss was about. Between designing mock ups for a
Speaker 1: new client and my third coffee, I searched River Park
Speaker 1: Runners out of mild curiosity. The club's website was bare bones,
Speaker 1: weekly meet ups, sign up links, a few race photos,
Speaker 1: but their instagram was more active, full of group shots, medals,
Speaker 1: sweaty finish line, arms around shoulders, scrolling. I spotted Ben
Speaker 1: front and center in a recent photo, grinning, cheeks flushed,
Speaker 1: standing next to a woman in an electric blue jacket.
Speaker 1: Her arm was around his back. Casual but a little familiar.
Speaker 1: I zoomed incompulsively. She was attractive, athletic, short, dark hair,
Speaker 1: nose ring. I'd never seen her before. I wanted to
Speaker 1: ask who was that, but stopped. I waited until Ben
Speaker 1: came home that night, bringing in a cool draft with him. Hey,
Speaker 1: I saw a photo from your running group, I said,
Speaker 1: hoping it sounded like casual curiosity, not the start of
Speaker 1: an interrogation. Is that the club leader? He blinked, then nodded. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's Lisa. She runs the whole show, super intense. She's
Speaker 1: run like six half marathons. Don't get jealous. She'd run
Speaker 1: circles around both of us. His laugh was easy, but
Speaker 1: his glance held just a second longer than usual, as
Speaker 1: if checking to see if I'd press further. I wanted to. Instead,
Speaker 1: I forced a light laugh. Maybe I'll have to sign
Speaker 1: up and keep an eye on you, he rolled his eyes.
Speaker 1: You could, but honestly, it's the least social thing ever.
Speaker 1: Everyone es in headphones, competing with themselves. It was almost
Speaker 1: convincing the way he said it. Almost the next day,
Speaker 1: Megan texted, saw Ben and a woman sharing a smoothie
Speaker 1: after club. You know her, I replied, must be Lisa.
Speaker 1: I guess she runs the club. Tacking on a lame joke.
Speaker 1: He's obviously upgraded his social group theory. But even as
Speaker 1: I typed, I was cataloging details. If Megan saw them together,
Speaker 1: why hadn't he mentioned it? Just as quickly I dismissed it.
Speaker 1: He probably forgot Ben was friendly, maybe Lisa was two.
Speaker 1: No reason to leap to conclusions. But I started noticing
Speaker 1: his runs were getting longer. He'd leave an hour early,
Speaker 1: saying he needed to warm up alone. He lingered after
Speaker 1: group sessions, always with a new reason, intervals, tempo days,
Speaker 1: challenging himself to faster splits. I tried asking why the
Speaker 1: extra laps. Ben barely looked up from his phone. Getting older,
Speaker 1: he joked, I want to keep up with those twenty
Speaker 1: five year olds. Then, without missing a beat, he switched topics.
Speaker 1: Did you see that weird email from our landlord water pipes? Again?
Speaker 1: I almost didn't notice the abruptness, the studded casualness. Then
Speaker 1: there was the credit card statement. Ben usually left handling
Speaker 1: bills to me. His only job was to forward receipts
Speaker 1: for client meals or mileage. This time I spotted five
Speaker 1: separate charges at a smoothie place near the park on Friday,
Speaker 1: after running club on Sunday afternoon, another on the previous Thursday.
Speaker 1: Always clustered around practice days. I brought it up over
Speaker 1: take out one night. We really love those smoothiesh he smiled, too,
Speaker 1: tightly treating the team after long runs. Every one takes
Speaker 1: turns buying. It's a thing, he didn't elaborate. You never
Speaker 1: mentioned that, I said, fishing for normal unsuspicious ground. He shrugged,
Speaker 1: it's new. I'll stop if it's a big deal. I
Speaker 1: didn't think it mattered. I couldn't quite say why it mattered.
Speaker 1: He was unusually eager to clear the plates, running his
Speaker 1: thumb along the rim, the way he does when he's
Speaker 1: thinking hard about something he won't say out loud. At
Speaker 1: dinner with friends on Saturday, some one asked Ben, how's Lisa.
Speaker 1: Is she still crushing it. Ben's smile faltered just for
Speaker 1: a split second, then he said quickly, she's great, running
Speaker 1: twice as fast as me. She's a machine. Then his
Speaker 1: eyes flicked across the table to check my expression, as
Speaker 1: if I was meant to supply a puntunch line. I
Speaker 1: just smiled, not trusting myself to say anything. On Tuesday,
Speaker 1: I took my own walk at River Park, an impulse
Speaker 1: while running errands that didn't need running at all. I
Speaker 1: deepward around the trails before practice time, headphones off, just
Speaker 1: breathing the cold, leaf smelling air. That's when I saw
Speaker 1: Ben and Lisa. They were off to the side, laughing,
Speaker 1: standing close. Her hand brushed his arm. Then they hugged,
Speaker 1: lingering longer than seemed strictly necessary for a sea You
Speaker 1: next week good bye. I ducked behind a birch, feeling childish.
Speaker 1: After a while they parted. Ben jogged off, Lisa tying
Speaker 1: her shoes before moving the other direction. I didn't follow.
Speaker 1: I just stood there, heart pounding, surprised by the heat
Speaker 1: in my cheeks. That night, Ben came home by seven,
Speaker 1: earlier than usual. He went straight to the shower, emerging scrubbed,
Speaker 1: pink hair, damp and a skew, the sharp herbal soap
Speaker 1: still clinging to him. Want to watch something, I asked
Speaker 1: from the couch. He shook his head, rubbing his neck
Speaker 1: so tired, rain check. I nodded. He disappeared into the bedroom.
Speaker 1: I stayed up late, painting in the half dark. My
Speaker 1: hands were steady, but my thoughts spun circles. The next morning,
Speaker 1: I forced myself to focus on work, redesigning a client's
Speaker 1: logo for the fourth time, deadline's looming, notifications pinging, But
Speaker 1: beneath the surface, I kept replaying small moments. Ben's laughter
Speaker 1: with Lisa, the too long hug, the abrupt changes of topic,
Speaker 1: the suddenly colder bed. He was still my Ben, careless
Speaker 1: with tupperware, always talking in big plans, But something essential
Speaker 1: felt shifted, and I didn't know if I was manufacturing
Speaker 1: anxiety or responding to some signal only I could see.
Speaker 1: Friday Night intimacy was a polite negotiation. We kissed slow
Speaker 1: and careful, but when I touched his hip, he murmured,
Speaker 1: maybe to morrow, babe. Sorry, run wore me out. I
Speaker 1: almost whispered, is it me? But I didn't trust myself
Speaker 1: not to sound needy or childish or both. Instead I
Speaker 1: rolled away counting breaths. The next week rolled on with
Speaker 1: a strange, tense energy. I tried to push past it.
Speaker 1: Booked a dinner with friends, asked Ben if we could
Speaker 1: host game Night again. He agreed, but his attention was
Speaker 1: mostly on his phone. He said work is nuts right now,
Speaker 1: with rates changing. I watched his thumbs fly in long
Speaker 1: texting bursts, always smiling just slightly. He'd always been friendly
Speaker 1: and sociable. That was one of the reasons I liked him,
Speaker 1: But now the club was giving him some new kind
Speaker 1: of energy, a charge, like he discovered a secret world
Speaker 1: that no longer needed my blessing. I was relieved, and
Speaker 1: yet in a way I couldn't quite name uneasy. It
Speaker 1: was on a rainy Thursday that things temporarily snapped back
Speaker 1: into place. I ducked into a local cafe for a
Speaker 1: midday meeting client, late coffee, tepid rains streaking the big
Speaker 1: front window. As I settled into a high stool, I
Speaker 1: heard my name. I turned and there she was, Lisa,
Speaker 1: the woman from the photos. She smiled, sliding into the
Speaker 1: seat beside me. Claire right, Ben's wife, so glad to
Speaker 1: finally meet. She offered her hand, firm, warm, easy smile.
Speaker 1: I managed a high yes without betraying my internal scramble.
Speaker 1: Lisa was magnetic up close, not intimidatingly gorgeous, but inviting,
Speaker 1: self assured without being showy. She wore a club hoodie
Speaker 1: and old running shoes. Her nails were bitten down, edges
Speaker 1: of a tattoo peeking out from her sleeve. We talked
Speaker 1: for ten minutes, mostly her talking honestly about neighborhood cafes,
Speaker 1: which jims were overpriced, which yoga classes she was not
Speaker 1: chill or co ordinated enough for. She mentioned her boyfriend twice,
Speaker 1: he works nights, so our schedules are a mess, and
Speaker 1: noted all these runners with careers no time to ever
Speaker 1: see each other outside the park. She seemed completely comfortable.
Speaker 1: No mention of Ben except in passing. He's got to
Speaker 1: get new shoes the amount he runs right, she teased.
Speaker 1: There was no tension in her posture, no secret in
Speaker 1: her eyes. By the time my client arrived, Lisa waved
Speaker 1: good bye. Tell Ben I say hi, and don't let
Speaker 1: him rope you into interval sprints. He'll talk you into
Speaker 1: it for the free smoothies. I relaxed. Maybe I'd invented
Speaker 1: the whole thing. Maybe Lisa was just physically affectionate, one
Speaker 1: of those social types who hugged everyone. If she had
Speaker 1: a boyfriend. Ben was probably just a friend, and I'd
Speaker 1: fallen down an anxiety spiral for nothing. That night, over dinner,
Speaker 1: I apologized. I told Ben I'd been weird about running
Speaker 1: club lately, confided that i'd bumped into Lisa, added that
Speaker 1: she's great, really normal coder. Suddenly embarrassed by my own doubts,
Speaker 1: Ben hugged me, pressing his cheek to my hair. Babe,
Speaker 1: thank you, he whispered, lingering longer than he had in weeks.
Speaker 1: I hated feeling like you didn't trust me. His affection
Speaker 1: felt genuine. It's not like I would have recognized a
Speaker 1: conspiracy in his hands or face. We went to bed early,
Speaker 1: socks tangled, conversation lighter, almost playful. For the first time
Speaker 1: in weeks, I felt something like relief, but it didn't last.
Speaker 1: Two days later, my phone buzzed with an Instagram d
Speaker 1: M a request from Lisa's account. Hope this isn't weird,
Speaker 1: but I feel like I should let you know. The
Speaker 1: message ended there, unsent or maybe deleted. It just said
Speaker 1: typing for a few moments, then nothing. Was it a mistake?
Speaker 1: Was she going to recommend a new yoga class? Or
Speaker 1: was she about to tell me something important? Why start
Speaker 1: and then stop? I stared at my phone, thumb hovering
Speaker 1: over except message. I typed and deleted let me know what,
Speaker 1: then finally shut my phone off. Ben was watching a
Speaker 1: cooking show in the other room, head resting on the sofa,
Speaker 1: arm unbothered. I spent the rest of the night trying
Speaker 1: to convince myself it was nothing, but the unease was back,
Speaker 1: burrowing under my ribs. Friday morning, Ben dashed out for
Speaker 1: an early trial run. I watched from the window as
Speaker 1: he jogged down the block, then lost sight of him
Speaker 1: past the bodega. After he left, I decided to do laundry, running,
Speaker 1: shirts and tights piling up in our shared hamper. As
Speaker 1: I was folding one of his new shirts, a crumpled
Speaker 1: hotel receipt slipped out. I frowned, smoothing it open Hotel Alchemy,
Speaker 1: not in our city, dated last Saturday night. I flipped
Speaker 1: through my calendar. Ben had told me he was doing
Speaker 1: a club trial run early the next morning. He gone
Speaker 1: to bed complaining about an early start, then left before sunrise.
Speaker 1: Why stay at a hotel for a local morning run.
Speaker 1: The hotel wasn't near the park, wasn't near any course
Speaker 1: I'd ever heard of. For a few minutes, I just
Speaker 1: stood in the bathroom, staring at the receipt, trying to
Speaker 1: logic my way around it. There had to be an explanation.
Speaker 1: Maybe he was covering for a friend. Maybe the club
Speaker 1: had a group event, but he hadn't mentioned any of it,
Speaker 1: and Ben loved talking about group events, especially when he
Speaker 1: got to be in charge. That afternoon, I called Paul,
Speaker 1: Ben's old friend from the gallery opening days, a fixture
Speaker 1: at every club barbecue, one of Ben's few not just
Speaker 1: work friends. Hey, Paul, I started casual as I could.
Speaker 1: Was Ben at running club last Saturday. He said it
Speaker 1: was an early one, threw off his whole sleep schedule.
Speaker 1: For a moment, there was only silence on the other end.
Speaker 1: Then Paul cleared his throat, m Saturday. Ah, No, I think.
Speaker 1: He said he had to drop everything to see his uncle.
Speaker 1: Figured you deno, he missed the group session. I felt cold, airless. Ah, thanks,
Speaker 1: see you soon. Paul sounded uncertain. Sure, Claire is everything? Okay?
Speaker 1: I hung up before my nerves gave me away. I
Speaker 1: sat down on the edge of our bed. The receipt,
Speaker 1: still clenched in my hand, whirled blurring around me. There
Speaker 1: had to be some way of making sense of this.
Speaker 1: Maybe Ben lied to Paul or me, but not both,
Speaker 1: or God. Maybe there was a group trip and he
Speaker 1: just didn't want me to know why. That night, I
Speaker 1: secretly opened Ben's fitness app on the iPad, hoping for
Speaker 1: reassurance more than evidence. He nearly always forgot to log
Speaker 1: out of things. Scrolling through activities, I saw GPS tracks
Speaker 1: marked Saturday that ended abruptly nowhere near the park. Instead,
Speaker 1: they finished at the edge of a different neighborhood, two
Speaker 1: blocks from Hotel Alchemy. I heard Ben coming up the
Speaker 1: hall keys Jack. My heart beat so loudly I half
Speaker 1: wondered if he would hear it too. He appeared in
Speaker 1: the doorway, face red from the cold, shaking flakes from
Speaker 1: his hair. Long day. You want take out, I nodded,
Speaker 1: quickly closing the app. That evening, he was solicitous, attentive,
Speaker 1: too attentive. He asked about my client project, fetched, my
Speaker 1: water kissed my hair line. When I finally found a
Speaker 1: moment to myself, my phone buzzed once again. Lisa again,
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, this is messy. I never wanted to hurt
Speaker 1: any one just that. I almost called her right away,
Speaker 1: but the sick feeling in my stomach told me anything
Speaker 1: Lisa confessed would just spell out what I already knew.
Speaker 1: I stared at my reflection in the hallway mirror, uncertain,
Speaker 1: my hands shaking. I wasn't sure if I was afraid
Speaker 1: of Ben lying, or of the world it would reveal
Speaker 1: if he started telling the truth. For a few hours,
Speaker 1: I pretended nothing was wrong. When Ben hugged me that night,
Speaker 1: I felt wooden, trying to feign warmth, wondering what had
Speaker 1: ever felt simple between us. I recounted every day he
Speaker 1: came home later than planned, every laundry load with new gear,
Speaker 1: every unexplained charge, and realized there was no way I
Speaker 1: could make these pieces fit a wholesome pattern. The truth,
Speaker 1: dense and unwelcome, was pressing in from all sides. All
Speaker 1: that remained was to face it, and still part of
Speaker 1: me hoped for an explanation that didn't tear our lives apart.
Speaker 1: But that explanation was growing harder and harder to assemble. Saturday,
Speaker 1: I couldn't settle. I kept busy, alternating between feverishly scrubbing
Speaker 1: grout lines in the kitchen and sorting digital project folders
Speaker 1: until even my desk top looked like it belonged to
Speaker 1: some one else. Ben left for a mid day long
Speaker 1: run with the club, pressed a quick kiss to my forehead,
Speaker 1: as if nothing weighed between us, then trotted out the
Speaker 1: door with his battered duff and a new water bottle
Speaker 1: I didn't remember him buying. I tried working, picking at
Speaker 1: logo revisions. My phone glared at me like a dare,
Speaker 1: every message notification bristling with potential. I opened Ben's Instagram,
Speaker 1: convincing myself it was curiosity, not obsession, not yet, no
Speaker 1: new posts, just a story, shared from the club's account,
Speaker 1: a boomerang of shoes pounding wet pavement. I replayed it.
Speaker 1: Ben might have been there, a flash of his shoes,
Speaker 1: the fringe of his sleeve, or maybe I was seeing
Speaker 1: clues that weren't there. Mid afternoon, Meghan texted you around
Speaker 1: to morrow brunch. I want the risotto recipe. For a moment,
Speaker 1: I put the day on pause, remembered that not every
Speaker 1: relationship was being re rooted behind my back. I wrote back, Absolutely,
Speaker 1: you me lots of carbs, She replied, love you also.
Speaker 1: Ben left his water bottle at the park table. Want
Speaker 1: me to bring it. I stared at the text, ice
Speaker 1: threading through my chest. Ben never mentioned seeing Meghan to day,
Speaker 1: and in his schedule earlier he'd insisted he was running alone.
Speaker 1: Was it a harmless drop by or something he deliberately
Speaker 1: left out? I typed and deleted three versions of did
Speaker 1: you see them together? Before settling on Oh, thanks for
Speaker 1: grabbing it. Did you catch up with him? She answered,
Speaker 1: just for a second, passing he was with Lisa and Tyler.
Speaker 1: I think I had to dash. Want coffee ice cream
Speaker 1: to morrow. I blinked at the screen. The familiar warmth
Speaker 1: of Megan's enthusiasm out of place, bouncing off the wall
Speaker 1: of my preoccupation. So he was with Lisa again. He
Speaker 1: hadn't mentioned Tyler before. Maybe I was pushing shadows around
Speaker 1: until they looked like monsters. That evening, as Ben came back,
Speaker 1: hair damp from the rain, shirt clinging to him in streaks,
Speaker 1: he whistled softly, tracing circles across my back. Brutal weather,
Speaker 1: but good company, he said, Teams getting faster. I made
Speaker 1: my face neutral, how s Tyler? I asked, watching for
Speaker 1: any flicker. He busied himself untangling his headphones. Who I
Speaker 1: forced an airy laugh. Meghan said she saw you guys,
Speaker 1: mentioned Lisa and Tyler. Ben's face shifted, not a full WinCE,
Speaker 1: more like a tick, quickly suppressed. Right, Tyler. He dropped early, though.
Speaker 1: Lisa and I just finished up. She's pushing for a
Speaker 1: city race next month. You know club leader stuff. I
Speaker 1: rolled a pen between my fingers, willing down my pulse.
Speaker 1: You too, seem to spend a lot of time together,
Speaker 1: he shrugged, voice a touch defensive. She's just intense about running.
Speaker 1: It's all pace charts and protein macros, not even time
Speaker 1: for small talk. I nodded, but left it at that,
Speaker 1: sensing that he was close to shutting down altogether. The
Speaker 1: chill in his posture was new. Even his jokes about
Speaker 1: stretching until I die landed off rhythm. That night, he
Speaker 1: peppered me with questions about Meghan, about my latest commission,
Speaker 1: about anything but himself. At one point, he leaned on
Speaker 1: the kitchen island, arms crossed, smiling carefully. Can we do
Speaker 1: date night soon? It feels like we've been ships, he said,
Speaker 1: And for an instant I saw the Ben I used
Speaker 1: to wake up beside, clumsy and earnest, beneath the layers
Speaker 1: of charm shaw, I said, voice escaping smaller than I meant.
Speaker 1: Maybe next week, he seemed relieved. Let it drop. I
Speaker 1: nearly believed myself. The days blurred together, each holding its
Speaker 1: own flavor of ordinary. I took on more deadlines, scheduled
Speaker 1: calls with new clients buried my restlessness under work. Ben's
Speaker 1: schedule stretched more unpredictably. Team building run at seven a m.
Speaker 1: He'd say, extra lapse after sunset helps me clear my head.
Speaker 1: He'd appear in the doorway at odd hours, looking simultaneously
Speaker 1: worn and newly alive. One night, I caught his reflection
Speaker 1: in the living room window, phone pressed tightly to his ear,
Speaker 1: voice quiet but animated. When I came in, he slipped
Speaker 1: it away, said client needs to move a showing nothing exciting.
Speaker 1: He didn't offer more details. I didn't ask. It's possible
Speaker 1: I was looking for arguments, not intentionally, but in that
Speaker 1: way you prodded a bruise to test if it really hurts.
Speaker 1: I'd notice coffee cups left in odd places, an unfamiliar
Speaker 1: rubber band around his wrist. He once mentioned a run
Speaker 1: group mean war in passing, but when I asked to see,
Speaker 1: he claimed the thread had already descended into chaos. Scrolling
Speaker 1: quickly past a private group chat. A Thursday morning, as
Speaker 1: I was boxing up designed prints to mail out, I
Speaker 1: caught Ben's phone buzzing on the countertop. The screen flashed
Speaker 1: l then dimmed. I wasn't proud of the two seconds
Speaker 1: I hesitated, thumb hovering inches from his phone before I
Speaker 1: walked away. I tried to reason with myself, stacking evidence
Speaker 1: on both sides. He'd always had close friends, male and female,
Speaker 1: and I never minded. We flirted with strangers for fun
Speaker 1: at parties, sometimes ranking who'd get more numbers if we
Speaker 1: were single again. Lisa, I decided, was just a name
Speaker 1: I didn't know well yet, not a person to fear.
Speaker 1: But even as I tried to write it off, some
Speaker 1: animal part of my brain stock pelled every discrepancy. A
Speaker 1: week later, I was running late for a client call,
Speaker 1: hair still damp, laptop balanced on my knees when Ben
Speaker 1: stopped in the doorway. Fresh from a run. He leaned
Speaker 1: against the jam, stretching his calves. Hey, he said, too
Speaker 1: lightly doing tight to night, I'm starving. I nodded, barely,
Speaker 1: registering sure order whatever he hovered new club member joined
Speaker 1: to day he mentioned crazy fast made me feel ancient.
Speaker 1: I reached for the normal rhythm. What's their name? He hesitated,
Speaker 1: just for a beat, Chris, I think some finance guy
Speaker 1: from up town. I jotted it down mentally, not because
Speaker 1: I was interested, but because I was tracking the pattern,
Speaker 1: every new name, every delay before he answered, every chance
Speaker 1: he took to steer the conversation away from Lisa. Dinner
Speaker 1: was quiet, Ben unusually attentive. You okay, he asked, half
Speaker 1: way through his curry. You've barely looked at me. I
Speaker 1: focused on my food, Just tired from calls, he put
Speaker 1: down his fork, pressing seriously, Claire, are we good? I
Speaker 1: forced a smile. Yeah, we're fine. I guess I miss
Speaker 1: you sometimes, That's all. He softened, reaching across the table.
Speaker 1: We're due for a vacation, get away, just as promise.
Speaker 1: We'll plan something soon. His eyes were warm, but the
Speaker 1: guilt I felt, not just for suspecting, but for tiptoeing,
Speaker 1: was sharp, white hot under my skin. I could have said, then,
Speaker 1: why does it always feel like you're somewhere else? But
Speaker 1: instead I nodded, echoing something I barely meant. That be nice.
Speaker 1: That Sunday, Megan and I met for brunch. The cafe
Speaker 1: was sun filled, bustling, the kind of place where you
Speaker 1: have to shout over the playlist just to order coffee.
Speaker 1: We talked about her job, her artist boyfriend, a new
Speaker 1: exhibit downtown, until finally she set down her mug and said,
Speaker 1: you see him off. Is everything okay with Ben? I hesitated.
Speaker 1: He's busy, I guess, and really into running. Obviously, I
Speaker 1: tried for a laugh. She eyed me, voice low. I
Speaker 1: saw him with Lisa again. She's cool, I think, But
Speaker 1: you know, I didn't even realize you guys hadn't met
Speaker 1: it just seemed like you were all club besties by now.
Speaker 1: I managed. I mostly let him have his thing. I
Speaker 1: figure i'd slow everyone down. Meghan poked at her toast.
Speaker 1: I mean, Lisa's super nice, but if you ever want
Speaker 1: me to tail Ben, she winked. You know, I've got
Speaker 1: a mustache, sunglasses ready. I laughed louder than I meant,
Speaker 1: surprising myself. God, I hope it never comes to that.
Speaker 1: She squeezed my hand, and just for a second, I
Speaker 1: remembered life before all this, before every conversation was a
Speaker 1: negotiation with myself, before every affectionate joke landed just off key.
Speaker 1: That afternoon, back at the apartment, I checked our credit
Speaker 1: card portal while calculating expenses for new home office software.
Speaker 1: Three coffee charges back to back at brood Awakenings, the
Speaker 1: caffe near the running path dates matched with day's. Ben
Speaker 1: said he was running alone. I tried to dismiss it
Speaker 1: as treating the team again, but the amounts were always
Speaker 1: the same. Two drinks, two pastries. I ran through explanations
Speaker 1: for Lisa, for Tyler, for any one but himself. That night,
Speaker 1: while Ben showered, I thumbed through his dirty laundry searching
Speaker 1: for any clue of another woman, lipstick, perfume, stray hair,
Speaker 1: the things you expect in bad daytime TV. I found nothing,
Speaker 1: only the faint, sour salt scent of sweat, the familiar
Speaker 1: shield of lemon detergent. I hated this version of myself, underhanded, suspicious,
Speaker 1: performing small betrayals of my own. At dinner, I was
Speaker 1: quieter than usual, unable to shut down the questioning engine
Speaker 1: in my head. At one point, I asked, half joking,
Speaker 1: maybe I should take up running. Need someone to pace you.
Speaker 1: Ben dried his hands on a dishcloth, studying me. You'd
Speaker 1: hate it, all that sweating for no reason. Besides, it's
Speaker 1: more fun if it's just mine for a bit, he smiled,
Speaker 1: almost gentle. Let me have this mid life crisis, will you?
Speaker 1: His words pricked at me. Am I not letting you?
Speaker 1: I asked, voice sharper than I intended. He tilted his head, surprised, Claire,
Speaker 1: don't start. You've never cared about this stuff before. Are
Speaker 1: you actually upset that I have friends? I backpedaled, stammering, no,
Speaker 1: it's not that, I just never mind. He shook his head,
Speaker 1: heading to the bedroom. The conversation ended, but a new
Speaker 1: fisher had opened between us, cooling everything just another degree.
Speaker 1: The next Thursday, it rained so hard the windows shivered.
Speaker 1: I had a late call shift, so I padded barefoot
Speaker 1: into the kitchen for a cup of camomile. Half past ten.
Speaker 1: That's when Ben's phone vibrated on the counter, a rare
Speaker 1: forgotten artifact. The screen glowed with a message thinking about
Speaker 1: you get home safe. Only initials ell For a second.
Speaker 1: I froze. I told myself, Lisa has a boyfriend. Maybe
Speaker 1: it was a group message, an auto corrected work text,
Speaker 1: anything but what it appeared to be. Ben came up
Speaker 1: behind me, towel around his neck, and reached for his phone.
Speaker 1: He saw my eyes, paused, what's up? His tone was careful, rehearsed.
Speaker 1: Someone messaged, I managed, did you want your tea? He
Speaker 1: smiled too quickly, Yeah, probably just club stuff. Lisa's always
Speaker 1: coordinating late. He pressed the cup into my hand, squeezed
Speaker 1: my shoulder, and retreated toward the bedroom, phone tight in
Speaker 1: his palm. That night, I lay awake, numbness spreading outward
Speaker 1: from my heart. I watched the digital clock's numbers advance,
Speaker 1: tried to catalog reasons, excuses, explanations that might make everything
Speaker 1: make sense. The next day, as if to overcompensate, Ben
Speaker 1: was effusive, making me an omelet, sending a meme texting
Speaker 1: from work, miss you. We should play hooky soon. For
Speaker 1: a moment, I doubted myself entirely. Was he just going
Speaker 1: through a phase? Was Lisa just an unusually chatty friend?
Speaker 1: Was I losing my mind? The following week, when Lisa's
Speaker 1: d M finally landed again, I'm sorry, this is messy.
Speaker 1: I never wanted to hurt anyone. The boundaries between paranoia
Speaker 1: and reality all but dissolved. The message sat there, stark,
Speaker 1: beside the ghost of her earlier unsent warning. There was
Speaker 1: no follow up, no explanation. Saturday, I sat at the
Speaker 1: kitchen counter, staring at our old wedding album, the pages
Speaker 1: now feeling two lives removed. Ben came in, watched my face, nostalgic, maybe,
Speaker 1: I admitted, I could feel him looking at me, weighing, measuring.
Speaker 1: He leaned against the cabinet, arms crossed, searching my eyes. Claire,
Speaker 1: you know I love you, right? I nodded the answer, trembling.
Speaker 1: I know. He seemed to want to say more, to
Speaker 1: fill the silence with reassurance, but after a pause, he
Speaker 1: just turned away, dropping his keys in the bowl with
Speaker 1: more force than usual. That night, with Ben asleep, I
Speaker 1: propped my laptop on my knees and steeled myself for
Speaker 1: the direct approach. I looked up Hotel Alchemy's location, forty
Speaker 1: minutes out of the city, nothing special, but close enough
Speaker 1: to the end of a marked GPS run i'd found
Speaker 1: in his app. The realization felt heavy, inevitable. There were
Speaker 1: no club events. There, no group messages about a team
Speaker 1: building brunch. He never mentioned an out of town race
Speaker 1: or a visit to this area with any one. The
Speaker 1: next morning, I called Lisa's number, found in the running
Speaker 1: group's EMIL thread. My voice was small, the question shaking
Speaker 1: my composure. Hey, this is Claire, Ben's wife. I wanted
Speaker 1: to ask if you had time to talk about the club.
Speaker 1: My question was so innocuous by design, it almost hurt.
Speaker 1: She answered, her voice soft, nearly apologetic. Hi, Claire, Sorry
Speaker 1: right now isn't good? Can I call you back in
Speaker 1: a bit? I breathed, of course, but knew by her
Speaker 1: tone that I wouldn't get the truth from her, not directly,
Speaker 1: not without some other shoe dropping first. That evening, Ben
Speaker 1: came home late, saying, sorry, last minute's showing ran long.
Speaker 1: My phone died. He tossed it on the charger. Fatigue
Speaker 1: etched across his brow, but the story lacked his usual gloss.
Speaker 1: There was no receipt in his pocket that night, nothing hard,
Speaker 1: just a sense of rehearsed normality that rang more hollow
Speaker 1: with each passing day. Days later, he left for a
Speaker 1: club leader dinner, saying Lisa and a few others were
Speaker 1: planning new race routes. I wanted so badly to believe it,
Speaker 1: to treat myself to take out and idle web browsing,
Speaker 1: as if our life wasn't balancing on a razor. But
Speaker 1: I kept waiting for some fresh proof, good or bad,
Speaker 1: that my reality wasn't built on a shifting line. As
Speaker 1: midnight approached and Ben was still out, I looked through
Speaker 1: his Strava history. His latest run night, miles New Peebee,
Speaker 1: ended at the same location as before, close by the hotel,
Speaker 1: nowhere near any obvious racing loop or park. Time matched
Speaker 1: the span of his dinner. There was even a photo
Speaker 1: muddy trail shoes propped next to a bottle of wine
Speaker 1: on cheap hotel carpet. The picture, posted only to his
Speaker 1: close friend's group, was meant to seem casual, but it
Speaker 1: told me all I needed. My resolve grew cold and sharp.
Speaker 1: I waited on the sofa, hair tied up, lamp overhead,
Speaker 1: flickering slightly each time a car passed on the street.
Speaker 1: When Ben's key chinked in the lock, I steadied myself.
Speaker 1: He had his running gear in a tight bundle. His
Speaker 1: eyes darted to my face. Hey, babe, sorry ran late.
Speaker 1: Lisa wanted me to ah help with training plans. His
Speaker 1: smile was thin, lips tight. I didn't move, Ben, I
Speaker 1: need to ask you something directly. He frowned about what
Speaker 1: I held out the hotel receipt I'd found, and his
Speaker 1: fitness tracker opened to the last set of co ordinates.
Speaker 1: Don't lie, Ben, where were you really? He took a
Speaker 1: step back, voiced defensive. I was running, Claire, you're making
Speaker 1: a big deal over nothing. I shook my head, heart pounding.
Speaker 1: I called Paul. You weren't with the club, the hotel,
Speaker 1: the roots and Lisa's messages. She's tried to reach out.
Speaker 1: His face crumpled, then hardened. What the hell are you
Speaker 1: checking up on me? Now looking through my stuff. That's
Speaker 1: not oka, Claire. I steadied my voice, answer me, are
Speaker 1: you and Lisa? His shoulders sagged. He stared at his shoes,
Speaker 1: the outline of defeat already seeping through his posture. I
Speaker 1: didn't plan it. It just happened. We were both stressed.
Speaker 1: We talked, one thing led to another. His voice was flat,
Speaker 1: deadened by exhaustion. How long I croaked He couldn't meet
Speaker 1: my gaze. I don't know. It was just once, but
Speaker 1: we kept talking. I was confused. O Ka. I didn't
Speaker 1: want to lose you. I just felt stuck. The room
Speaker 1: filled with the sound of my breathing. For a moment,
Speaker 1: I hated him with an intensity I hadn't known I
Speaker 1: could feel. Then At once, I just felt hollow. He
Speaker 1: tried to reach for me, then seemed to think better
Speaker 1: of it. I'm sorry, Clare. I never meant for this
Speaker 1: to blow up like this. Lisa wanted to tell you,
Speaker 1: but I told her not to. She broke up with
Speaker 1: her boyfriend. She leaned on me. I leaned back. It's
Speaker 1: not how it sounds. I stared at him, refusing to
Speaker 1: let him turn this into both our failing. No, Ben,
Speaker 1: it is exactly how it sounds. If you didn't want
Speaker 1: to lose me, you could have chosen differently. You didn't
Speaker 1: want to He sat, head between his hands, pleading quietly.
Speaker 1: It didn't mean anything. I was just lost. I needed
Speaker 1: to feel something was new again. I gathered the hotel receipt,
Speaker 1: set it on the table between us, let the silence
Speaker 1: answer for me. His shame was thick in the air.
Speaker 1: It pressed against my ribs until I could no longer
Speaker 1: take another breath. In his presence, I need you to
Speaker 1: leave Ben for to night, maybe longer. I can't be
Speaker 1: here with you right now. He stood as if ready
Speaker 1: to argue, but took in the set of my jaw
Speaker 1: and left, gathering a few belongings in a jim bag
Speaker 1: as quietly as he could manage. The door closed with
Speaker 1: a click. I sank to the floor, the evidence of
Speaker 1: our years, keys, mugs, tangled charger chords, an ache that
Speaker 1: felt endless and formless. I texted Megan, can you come over?
Speaker 1: She was there inside an hour, arms open, face crumpled
Speaker 1: with worry. We didn't talk about what happened, not at first.
Speaker 1: She made tea. We sat together, repeating the rhythms of
Speaker 1: the care we'd offered each other during mid twenties break ups,
Speaker 1: only this time it felt like I was being excavated
Speaker 1: from stone. At midnight, I lay in bed, our bed,
Speaker 1: now remade as only mine, staring at the ceiling patterns,
Speaker 1: the hush settling over the apartment. I listened for Ben's
Speaker 1: footsteps in the hallway, out of long habit, and heard nothing.
Speaker 1: I wasn't sure if I felt relief or desolation. At sunrise,
Speaker 1: I woke, unsure if I'd slept at all, and typed
Speaker 1: a simple email to my supervisor family emergency taking some
Speaker 1: time off, thank you for understanding. I made coffee in
Speaker 1: the quiet. The apartment was steeped in early gold light.
Speaker 1: The kitchen table still cluttered with receipts, half finished mugs,
Speaker 1: and the glare of my laptop screen. I picked up
Speaker 1: my phone. Lisa's dangling unfinished message on Instagram blinked at
Speaker 1: me from the top of the notifications. For the first time,
Speaker 1: I felt nothing but steadiness as I tapped and deleted
Speaker 1: the thread. I sipped coffee in the silence, letting it
Speaker 1: settle cold in my chest instead of heat. The new
Speaker 1: day outside looked ordinary, washed clean for the first time
Speaker 1: in weeks, I realized I was waiting for nothing at all.
Speaker 1: The coffee tasted sharp, almost metallic, on my tongue as
Speaker 1: I sat at the kitchen table, hands wrapped around the mug,
Speaker 1: more for something to do than for warmth. The front
Speaker 1: window admitted a dull, indifferent morning light. No golden promises,
Speaker 1: just the unvarnished mess of a day after everything came apart,
Speaker 1: my phone vibrated three new messages, all from Megan. She
Speaker 1: was already up, asking if I'd slept, if I wanted
Speaker 1: her to bring muffins, if I needed anything practical, I
Speaker 1: answered only one, Just Coffee's fine. Still here, somewhere between
Speaker 1: the ticking of the wall clock and the metallic scratch
Speaker 1: of the spoon inside the mug, I heard Ben's key
Speaker 1: in the door. My whole body tensed, a reflex, not
Speaker 1: a choice, the ghost deck of our old rhythm. He
Speaker 1: always popped back for something, But this time it wasn't
Speaker 1: his voice calling out, just the soft patter of steps
Speaker 1: on hardwood. And then he was there, standing awkwardly in
Speaker 1: the threshold, with a duffel bag slung low across his
Speaker 1: chest and a look that didn't ask permission. He didn't
Speaker 1: come in further. Just need my work laptop, he murmured,
Speaker 1: eyes on the floor. My heart kicked, then settled into
Speaker 1: a dull, hard thud. I nodded toward the desk, not
Speaker 1: trusting myself to speak. He crossed the living room on
Speaker 1: careful feet, a shadow of the man who used to
Speaker 1: breeze in, making the space bigger by half with his presence.
Speaker 1: His hands shook as he lifted the laptop and charger.
Speaker 1: When he turned back, his lips parted as if to
Speaker 1: start some last minute defense or apology, but whatever he
Speaker 1: meant to say shrank in the air between us. A silence,
Speaker 1: short but deep, filled the space. You can stay if
Speaker 1: you need anything else. I'm fine, I managed, and it
Speaker 1: was almost true. At least I was still upright, clothed, composure,
Speaker 1: mostly intact. He searched my face, probably looking for some
Speaker 1: sign anger, invitation, anything, but I gave him nothing that
Speaker 1: I realized was all I had left to offer. He swallowed,
Speaker 1: blinked a little too quickly, then exited, closing the door
Speaker 1: quietly behind him, leaving the lock unset, a small final gesture,
Speaker 1: still expecting to belong or maybe hoping for it. Meghan
Speaker 1: arrived ten minutes later, armed with a tray of coffees
Speaker 1: and a paper bag. She pushed toward me wordlessly. She
Speaker 1: saw my face, embraced me from behind, and then sat
Speaker 1: down heavily across the table. What do you want to
Speaker 1: do now, she asked quietly. I stared at her, at
Speaker 1: the battered table top between us, at my still shaking fingers.
Speaker 1: I didn't know. I felt stripped of options, numb in
Speaker 1: a way that was somehow both familiar and alien. I
Speaker 1: don't know, I said. I think I just need to
Speaker 1: get through to day. Megan nodded, pressing her lips together.
Speaker 1: She took over the silent domestic rituals, unloading and reloading
Speaker 1: the dishwasher, opening blinds, pushing my untouched mug closer when
Speaker 1: I shrank away. Neither of us mentioned Ben or Lisa,
Speaker 1: or even the exact word for what was un raveling
Speaker 1: between us. It was as if naming it would make
Speaker 1: it permanent. She left after an hour, seeing my need
Speaker 1: for solitude, promising text me anything any time. Her departure
Speaker 1: left the apartment echoing with the quiet that comes after
Speaker 1: a storm when the roof holds but you can see
Speaker 1: the water seeping in at the seams. I spent the
Speaker 1: afternoon moving through the apartment, setting things in order that
Speaker 1: had become cymbals. The risotto now joined by a crusted
Speaker 1: over smoothie bottle, Ben's charger unplugged from its wall nest,
Speaker 1: a half finished painting propped up on the easel untouched
Speaker 1: for weeks. Each item carried its own weight, a gravity
Speaker 1: I kept tripping over. When the phone rang again in
Speaker 1: the late afternoon, I answered, on instinct my sister. She'd
Speaker 1: seen a drop off in my texts and was calling
Speaker 1: to check in for the third time that week. Hey you,
Speaker 1: she said, cautious, layering her voice with the kind of
Speaker 1: ease she reserved for emergencies. What's going on? I told
Speaker 1: her only the broadest contours. Something had happened with Ben.
Speaker 1: I needed space. No, there was nothing she could fix
Speaker 1: right now. She heard what I left unsaid, but she
Speaker 1: didn't push. You want me to come by, or do
Speaker 1: you want the day to yourself? Let's wait until tomorrow,
Speaker 1: I said, maybe I'll know what I need by then.
Speaker 1: After we hung up, the heavy quiet returned, this time
Speaker 1: less foreign, more like a protective shell. I didn't want
Speaker 1: to vent any more, didn't want analysis, advice, or comfort.
Speaker 1: All I wanted was freedom from other people's understanding. Just
Speaker 1: after five, a sudden, sharp rap at the door broke
Speaker 1: my trance. My stomach tightened. I stood, composing whatever face
Speaker 1: I had left, and cracked the door. Ben stood in
Speaker 1: the hallway, looking even more crumpled than before, his duffel gone,
Speaker 1: hands empty, Claire, can I do you have a minute?
Speaker 1: His tone suggested he'd been rehearsing this tree for hours,
Speaker 1: if not for days. He didn't meet my eyes. I
Speaker 1: held the door half open. If it's about us, I
Speaker 1: don't know what to say right now. He shifted his weight,
Speaker 1: working his jaw, eyes rimmed red. I just need to
Speaker 1: get a few things. I thought maybe we could talk
Speaker 1: or something. This time, I stepped aside, letting him in,
Speaker 1: but stayed by the door. He didn't look around. He
Speaker 1: went to the bedroom and began packing a pile of
Speaker 1: clothes into a clean tote bag. Work shirts, jeans, the
Speaker 1: mismatched socks. I always teased him about. His movements were mechanical,
Speaker 1: only occasionally pausing to fold something the way he knew
Speaker 1: I preferred muscle memory, ghosts of better habits. When he
Speaker 1: emerged duffel bulging. He set it down, then finally faced me.
Speaker 1: I don't expect forgiveness. I just want to explain, not
Speaker 1: for me, for both of us. I closed my arms
Speaker 1: around my waist, bracing for what had to come. It
Speaker 1: started as running, he said, voice dull with shame. I
Speaker 1: swear that was all. It just spiraled with Lisa. It
Speaker 1: felt easy, you know, no pressure, no history. She listened.
Speaker 1: I stayed silent. I'm sure if he expected permission to
Speaker 1: go on, he took my silence as license. I didn't
Speaker 1: mean for it to become anything, Ben continued. He squeezed
Speaker 1: the back of his neck, searching for explanations. I never
Speaker 1: thought it would get physical. It was just talking, confiding
Speaker 1: in someone who didn't know every angle of my life.
Speaker 1: Then she broke up with her boyfriend. We met outside
Speaker 1: of the club. One thing followed the next. He looked
Speaker 1: at me helpless. I told myself I could stop any time,
Speaker 1: that it wouldn't touch us, that i'd pull back. But
Speaker 1: she needed me, and I didn't know how to say no.
Speaker 1: The admission, soft, ugliest as any, lie landed flat. I
Speaker 1: heard myself respond, my voice smaller than I intended. Did
Speaker 1: you tell her you loved her. He shook his head instantly,
Speaker 1: face contorting. No, never, it wasn't that I never wanted.
Speaker 1: I was running away from stress, from everything I hated
Speaker 1: about myself at work, the stuff I couldn't say to
Speaker 1: you because I wanted to protect you. Lisa. She was
Speaker 1: like an escape hatch. I let out a single, short
Speaker 1: laugh and me, what was I? He blinked. You were
Speaker 1: always the person I wanted to come home to, even
Speaker 1: when I was lying. Even then, that strung more than
Speaker 1: anything else. A glimpse of the love I remembered, warped,
Speaker 1: but not entirely gone. He stepped forward, regret etched deep
Speaker 1: across his face, but I held my ground. I want
Speaker 1: to fix it, he whispered, voice thickening. I'll do whatever
Speaker 1: it takes. I wanted to believe him, for the sake
Speaker 1: of every undone chore, every inside joke, every winter night
Speaker 1: we'd bundled together and spun plans for the future. I
Speaker 1: wanted to. But the image of him in that hotel,
Speaker 1: of Lisa's hesitant confession blinking in my d MS, blocked
Speaker 1: out everything else. It's too late, I said, finally, my
Speaker 1: words coming out cracked. You don't get to ask for
Speaker 1: more forgiveness than I have left. He nodded, as if
Speaker 1: he'd already understood, picking up his bag and moving toward
Speaker 1: the door, he stopped turning one last time, as if
Speaker 1: hoping for rescue. I never stopped loving you, Claire, even
Speaker 1: if I didn't act like it. I let the silence
Speaker 1: stand for us both. He shut the door behind him,
Speaker 1: this time setting the lock with a decisive click. Twilight
Speaker 1: edged in through the kitchen window, lending the day a bruised,
Speaker 1: uncertain hue. I made myself finish a slice of toast,
Speaker 1: chewing mechanically. There was a grainy comfort in practicality, calories, errands,
Speaker 1: routines that outlast the people they were meant for. Later,
Speaker 1: as I tried for a shower and clean pajamas, my
Speaker 1: phone flared another message from Lisa. This time it was
Speaker 1: only three words, I'm so sorry. No explanation, no attempt
Speaker 1: to explain herself. I considered blocking her, then just left
Speaker 1: it unread. That night, stripped of the daily script of togetherness,
Speaker 1: sleep eluded me. I lay in bed, aware of every
Speaker 1: creak of the apartment, every passing car. The other side
Speaker 1: of the bed still indented by Ben's weight felt both
Speaker 1: hostile and pathetic. When the sun finally bled in through
Speaker 1: the blinds, I got up. Breakfast was too dry, crackers
Speaker 1: and coffee. I sat on the edge of the bed,
Speaker 1: holding my phone, uselessly, willing myself not to call Ben,
Speaker 1: not to answer Megan's gentle questions. Another afternoon, another orbit
Speaker 1: of the apartment. My thoughts flickered between rage, sorrow, and
Speaker 1: a heavy, florrid nothingness. I put on an old playlist, Ben's,
Speaker 1: of Course, and then quickly shut it off, unable to
Speaker 1: bear the overlay of nostalgia and absence. As the week
Speaker 1: end rolled on, the outside world pressed back in, my
Speaker 1: sister called, Megan, visited again. My mother left voicemails offering
Speaker 1: to come help you sort through things. Her code for
Speaker 1: pack is stuff and issue ultimatums. I rejected each offer,
Speaker 1: determined to face the crater alone, at least for now.
Speaker 1: On Sunday, a knock gentler than Ben's habitual arrival came
Speaker 1: at the door. I opened it to see Lisa, hair
Speaker 1: damp from rain, eyes swollen. She spoke before I could ask,
Speaker 1: can I talk to you? Her voice was raw, afraid.
Speaker 1: If you don't want to see me, I'll go. Every
Speaker 1: sensible cell in my body wanted to slam the door,
Speaker 1: but curiosity, a brittle need for wholeness, maybe kept me
Speaker 1: from moving five minutes, I said, stepping aside and crossing
Speaker 1: my arms, blocking half the entry. She stood in the
Speaker 1: living room, every muscle tight. Aye. I wanted to apologize.
Speaker 1: I didn't know how to tell you before. At first
Speaker 1: I thought Ben and I were just talking, helping each
Speaker 1: other cope. Then my relationship ended, and I leaned more
Speaker 1: than I should have. It wasn't fair to you, or
Speaker 1: to him, or to anyone. Really, She stressed each word
Speaker 1: with an earnestness. I almost hated her for I wanted
Speaker 1: to tell you, but Ben said he asked me not to.
Speaker 1: He said he'd fix things himself, that he'd already made
Speaker 1: you suspicious. I let myself believe that was kinder. Somehow,
Speaker 1: I stared at her, seeing only the shape of the threat,
Speaker 1: behind all the explanations of friendship, all the easy chemistry.
Speaker 1: You knew he lied to me. Did you care? Lisa
Speaker 1: bit her lip. I cared not enough. Obviously, he acted lost,
Speaker 1: and I convinced myself I was fixing him. But I
Speaker 1: always knew underneath what we were doing I'm really sorry,
Speaker 1: I nodded the motion, slow, detached. I don't want to
Speaker 1: know the details. She looked at her feet. I understand.
Speaker 1: I hope you wont have to see me again. I
Speaker 1: let her words hang, neither forgiving nor condemning her, just grateful.
Speaker 1: When she made a hurried, quiet exit, I locked the
Speaker 1: door behind her, slid down the frame, and sat with
Speaker 1: my knees pressed hard into my chest, shaking but not crying.
Speaker 1: Megan came that evening with Chinese food and a bottle
Speaker 1: of wine. She didn't ask what happened, but her presence
Speaker 1: filled the apartment in a way that didn't demand anything
Speaker 1: of me. We ate on the floor, sifting through the
Speaker 1: detritus of my relationship, photos, old take out menus, mismatched
Speaker 1: mugs between mouthfuls. She finally asked, what do you need now?
Speaker 1: A pause as I considered, I need to not feel
Speaker 1: like an idiot, I said, voice rough, and maybe to
Speaker 1: not see either of them again. She nudged me, not
Speaker 1: your fault, Claire, not even close. It wasn't comfort exactly,
Speaker 1: but it was solid ground. As the week wore on,
Speaker 1: I shaped my days around small victories, doing a load
Speaker 1: of laundry that was only mine, ordering groceries. I liked,
Speaker 1: reclaiming the couch for work, calls and lazy stretches alike.
Speaker 1: Each simple act felt like a stitch. Rough but necessary.
Speaker 1: Messages from Ben dwindled from desperate. Can we talk? This
Speaker 1: isn't how it ends? Is it to functional? Lease? Renewal
Speaker 1: is up soon? Should I cancel the gas bill? I
Speaker 1: answered each one with an economy I didn't know I possessed.
Speaker 1: There were things, after all, that could be resolved without
Speaker 1: reopening the wound. Once, late at night, I drafted a message,
Speaker 1: something scalding, creative, all the angry truth I wanted to unload,
Speaker 1: but in the end I deleted it. There was nothing
Speaker 1: left to say. On Thursday, the landlord confirmed our lease
Speaker 1: was up for renewal in two weeks. The reality of
Speaker 1: the dissolution legal and final. As paperwork forced itself in.
Speaker 1: Ben wanted to split it, to sublet if possible, But
Speaker 1: I knew I couldn't walk these rooms every day, reliving
Speaker 1: old arguments or feeling for the missing weight of his keys.
Speaker 1: That evening, I boxed up what was his shoes, jackets,
Speaker 1: the left over running medals, the neon band, he'd worn
Speaker 1: out from habit. I set the box by the door,
Speaker 1: left a note, please arrange to pick up when I'm out.
Speaker 1: A day later, the box was gone, no note in return,
Speaker 1: no attempt at last words. Friday arrived, gray and cold.
Speaker 1: The city outside was just itself again, the park across
Speaker 1: the street filled with early joggers, the same club I
Speaker 1: d once championed in a naive effort to save us
Speaker 1: from ordinary unhappiness. I brewed one last coffee in the kitchen,
Speaker 1: staring out the window at the runners, shifting on their toes,
Speaker 1: waiting for the count off. Somewhere out there the group
Speaker 1: the pulse Ben was probably circling in his own orbit,
Speaker 1: strange and unreachable. I was a spectator again, not waiting,
Speaker 1: not chasing, not forgiving. I glanced back at the living room,
Speaker 1: the traces of the couple we'd been, a half painted canvas,
Speaker 1: the list of weekend projects never finished, the mugs from
Speaker 1: our last joint coffee now cold and drying. I stood
Speaker 1: there for a moment, feeling the empty space shift and
Speaker 1: settle around me. Then I set my mug down, pulled
Speaker 1: my hair into a braid, grabbed my keys, and left
Speaker 1: the apartment. Without looking back at the curb, I stopped
Speaker 1: and drew one breath, a slow, certain inhale that filled
Speaker 1: me from the inside out. There was nothing familiar left
Speaker 1: to claim, but as I started walking, the world felt
Speaker 1: just wide enough for one person. Moving forward. After a block,
Speaker 1: I stopped for the crosswalk, a light wind pushing my
Speaker 1: braid against my neck. I felt exposed, no armor of purpose,
Speaker 1: no partner beside me. The city's noise suddenly sharper. I
Speaker 1: didn't want to turn back, not even to check if
Speaker 1: the apartment windows glowed above. A crisp raw kind of
Speaker 1: paine surfaced. I was no longer the person who waited
Speaker 1: with dinner for some one running late. I was just me,
Speaker 1: with nowhere I needed to be. The park across the
Speaker 1: street was emptying out Saturday runners, dispersing a few lone figures,
Speaker 1: stretching or jabbing at GPS watches. For a minute, I
Speaker 1: almost crossed, drawn by a compulsion to retrace the same loop,
Speaker 1: see if the world would look different from Ben's side.
Speaker 1: But I couldn't do it, not yet, not if every
Speaker 1: path and trail was mapped in some echo of their laughter,
Speaker 1: their secret silences. Instead, I turned away from the park
Speaker 1: and walked past the bakery where Ben and I used
Speaker 1: to stop for quassas after brutal Sunday hangovers, past the
Speaker 1: cafe with over exposed pastries, past the mural that marked
Speaker 1: our corner for visiting friends. I let myself wander, relishing
Speaker 1: the odd comfort of anonymity. The day was damp and cool,
Speaker 1: pavements slick from last night's rain, and there was nowhere
Speaker 1: I needed to justify myself. Somewhere over my shoulder, a
Speaker 1: runner pounded past in neon headphones, in utterly oblivious to
Speaker 1: the rawness of the world. I found myself envying his detachment,
Speaker 1: that focus, that clarity, miles unspooling with no pass to
Speaker 1: chase him. I realized as I walked how much of
Speaker 1: my life had been shaped by the roots Bend carved
Speaker 1: into it, his short cuts, his routines, his charisma that
Speaker 1: pulled people into our orbit. For years, I defined myself
Speaker 1: as Ben's wife, half of a unit that always made
Speaker 1: sense at parties or Sunday brunch. Now that gravity was gone,
Speaker 1: I was a free agent in my own life, and
Speaker 1: the vertigo was equal parts thrilling and terrifying. I circled
Speaker 1: several blocks before stopping by the river that cut through
Speaker 1: our neighborhood. The water was high from the rain, the
Speaker 1: current fast, brown with sediment, and pierced with silver streaks
Speaker 1: of light reflected from passing cars. I leaned against the railer,
Speaker 1: watching the surface break and reform, remembering every run Ben
Speaker 1: had planned along this path, the way he'd mapped loops
Speaker 1: for every contingency too cold, too hot, too muddy. I
Speaker 1: couldn't shake the knowledge that each of those roots had
Speaker 1: become invitations for secrets I never consented to give. Behind me,
Speaker 1: an old man cast a fishing line into the water,
Speaker 1: patient and content. Beyond him, two teenagers sat on a bench,
Speaker 1: oblivious to me, to all adult heartbreak. Probably I let
Speaker 1: that be enough. I stayed until my legs ached and
Speaker 1: my teeth chattered, until I could breathe without my throat
Speaker 1: closing up. On my way back, my phone vibrated with
Speaker 1: an e mail. I checked it logistical from the landlord,
Speaker 1: but the subject line lease urgent, was enough to tense
Speaker 1: every muscle in my body. I ducked into the alcove
Speaker 1: beside our building to read it in peace, back pressed
Speaker 1: against cold concrete. Ben had already responded, suggest sting a
Speaker 1: call to finalize division of property and deposit. Even in
Speaker 1: this he was brisk, transactional, as if the aftermath of
Speaker 1: betrayal required no more tact than splitting a security deposit.
Speaker 1: It made me almost angry, relief and irritation in equal measure.
Speaker 1: I didn't want to talk logistics. I wanted noise and mess,
Speaker 1: something visceral to mark the boundaries. But all I was
Speaker 1: left with were receipts and digital signatures, the streamlined brutality
Speaker 1: of modern endings. Back inside, I started sorting kitchen first,
Speaker 1: where memories bled into objects. Mugs I'd bought because Ben
Speaker 1: said they fit his hands, the risotto pot, its handle
Speaker 1: forever loose, the French press we'd researched together, reading reviews.
Speaker 1: Late at night, I carried his running medals and left
Speaker 1: them in a pile next to notebooks full of club
Speaker 1: training plans reminders scribbled in his hasty hand. Bit by bit,
Speaker 1: I shaped the apartment into something less shared, more neutral,
Speaker 1: as if the absence might ease the memory of what
Speaker 1: used to be. Messages trickled in from friends, Megan, my sister,
Speaker 1: even Paul, each with their own brand of support. Paul
Speaker 1: apologized that he'd missed obvious signs that he thought Ben
Speaker 1: was just blowing off steam. I replied, in tight phrases,
Speaker 1: not your fault, thanks for checking in. Let's give it time.
Speaker 1: Each press of the send button felt like a suture,
Speaker 1: loosely knitting up old wounds, but never sealing them fully.
Speaker 1: By Sunday night, the exhaustion was bone deep. I lay
Speaker 1: on top of the covers, phone face down on the dresser. Outside,
Speaker 1: the street lights flickered, the city making its own plans,
Speaker 1: utterly indifferent to heartbreak. Ben messaged twice more, can we
Speaker 1: talk properly? And later? I know I can't fix it,
Speaker 1: but I want to try. Both unread, both deleted. I
Speaker 1: wasn't ready to let him back into my mind. Maybe
Speaker 1: not ever. Monday brought the final meeting with the LADD.
Speaker 1: I agreed to a video call, too formal, in my
Speaker 1: own apartment, wearing clean jeans and a sweater that didn't
Speaker 1: fit quite right. Ben appeared on camera from an unfamiliar couch, eyes, dark, circled, voice, subdued.
Speaker 1: We discussed money, logistics, his new mailing address, each topic
Speaker 1: as impersonal as possible. At the end, the landlord signed off,
Speaker 1: leaving us alone for a moment, an awkward echo of
Speaker 1: every private conversation that used to belong only to us.
Speaker 1: Ben cleared his throat. Do you want to keep anything,
Speaker 1: he asked, gesturing toward the box of books he'd left
Speaker 1: last week. Just what's mine? I said, The rest I'll
Speaker 1: donate or toss. He nodded. There was a silence, heavy
Speaker 1: and resigned. Claire, he said, voice wavering for the first time.
Speaker 1: I wish i'd said something sooner, So do I, I replied,
Speaker 1: But wishing doesn't undo it. He hesitated, then gave the
Speaker 1: smallest of nods. Okay, I'll finish moving out by the
Speaker 1: end of the week. The call ended. I rested my
Speaker 1: head on the table, letting the relief wash through on
Speaker 1: top of the persistent numbness. Days passed in a blur
Speaker 1: of small chores, final emails, the mechanical work of untangling
Speaker 1: two lives. Sometimes I found myself at the window, watching
Speaker 1: for a familiar silhouette, but I always turned away before
Speaker 1: any one appeared. On Thursday night, as I packed the
Speaker 1: last box of Ben's things, another message arrived, this one
Speaker 1: from Lisa, long and apologetic. She wanted for the hundredth
Speaker 1: time to express her regret to make sure I understood
Speaker 1: it was never meant to be hurtful. In the subject line,
Speaker 1: she'd written no excuses, just sorry I didn't open it.
Speaker 1: Guilt and forgiveness, apologies and explanations. None of those things
Speaker 1: would restore what had been hollowed out. I'd spend enough
Speaker 1: time trying to reshape the story around both their versions
Speaker 1: of remorse. Instead, I sat in the silent living room
Speaker 1: and let my eyes travel over what remained. One battered
Speaker 1: arm chair, my sketch books, a mug of cold tea,
Speaker 1: the evidence of my life, stripped of every borrowed piece.
Speaker 1: The next morning, I woke to a shaft of sunlight
Speaker 1: cutting across the kitchen tiles. I made coffee, drawing in
Speaker 1: the sharp, fragrant air, then gathered my keys and left
Speaker 1: the apartment for the last time before the real hand over.
Speaker 1: The city was waking, car's idling, someone's radio echoing on
Speaker 1: the street, a scattering of runners on the park pavement.
Speaker 1: I paused by the front steps. My phone rang. The
Speaker 1: old rington Ben had set on a whim during happier months.
Speaker 1: I watched it vibrate, breath quickening, but I refused the call.
Speaker 1: I tucked the phone back in my pocket and squared
Speaker 1: my shoulders. Feeling resolved settle at last, at the corner,
Speaker 1: I paused for the crossing signal. The day had already
Speaker 1: grown warmer, promising new beginnings as indifferently as it had
Speaker 1: delivered endings. I took a long breath, exhaled, and stepped
Speaker 1: off the curb. My path for better or worse was
Speaker 1: finally my own,