We stay at home

Then, one day, after he spent morning in dealing with harsh meetings and cryptic administrative emails, I saw him leaving work. It was barely noon, but he was already walking towards his overly expensive car, shoulders hunched forward, moving with that defeated, waddling gait that made him look smaller and fatter than ever. He didn’t even glance up as he passed, just gave the briefest, most perfunctory nod as if he were a butler excusing himself from a room where guests were still talking. And for some reason, this time, I felt sorry for him. The sort of sorry you feel when you see a dog locked in a hot car—so wretched and helpless that you hate yourself for not being able to do anything about it.

I watch him drive away, But I still had work to do, and as a trainee I couldn’t leave until my supervisor said so. And he was strict about also leaving five minutes past your check out time.

It was almost dark by the time I got home. I remember the exact arrangement of shadows on the porch, the weird golden light coming in from the side window, the smell of laundry detergent and wet leaves. I let myself in, keys jangling too loud, and saw them both at the kitchen table, Wiley and Sarah, seated across from each other with matching ceramic mugs and what looked like—absurdly—one of those expensive French press coffee pots I never knew we owned. They weren’t talking. They weren’t even looking at each other. Sarah was picking at the rim of her mug, chipping at a fleck of glaze with her thumbnail. Wiley was hunched over, arms crossed, staring at the wood grain of the table with a sort of **** focus.

For some reason my first thought was: At least they’re not naked or entangled or in any way physically touching. The notion that everything might be fine, that this was just two adults drinking coffee and failing to make conversation, lasted exactly the three seconds it took for Wiley to look up, eyes rimmed red, and call her name.

“Sarah,” he said. Not Sara-Bear, not the cutesy diminutive that I’d grown to hate with a ferocity that embarrassed me. There was no affection in it, no claim, just a thin and almost broken syllable. The absence of the nickname was like a missing tooth in a smile. I thought it would make me happy, but it made me sick.

Sarah said nothing. She held her breath, I think, either waiting for him to finish or for the moment to pass. The silence in the room was thick enough to touch. You could hear the refrigerator click and the soft fizz as the baseboard heater cycled on. I stood in the foyer, not sure whether to announce myself or back out quietly and go sit in the car.

Finally, Sarah glanced at me. She didn’t smile. Her eyes were rimmed with a kind of puffy irony, as if she’d spent all her tears and now was left with only the swollen aftermath. I tried to mouth something reassuring, but my face didn’t cooperate.

Wiley stood abruptly, scraping his chair against the tile, and mumbled something about needing to use the bathroom. He moved past me in the hallway without making eye contact, shuffling his feet like he was afraid of being heard.

Then it was just me and Sarah.

I didn’t know how to ask the question, but I did anyway, because cowardice had never suited me. “Did you fuck him without me watching?” My words hung in the air, ugly and accusing, and instantly I hated myself for the way they sounded. But there was no taking them back. Not now.

Sarah didn’t look at me. Her hands shook, spilling coffee on the counter. She put the mug down, pressed her palms together until her knuckles blanched, then finally looked up with swollen eyes. “Sorry,” she whispered, as if it were the only word she knew. “He came home complaining today. Said how it’s taking a lot more money than he thought to keep the company alive, and that he is risking most of his fortune, just so you don’t lose your job.” She paused, stared at her hands, and I saw her lips quiver. “One thing led to another.”