I kicked off my own boots, wiped them down with a disinfectant wipe, then toed them into the “miscellaneous” slot, just to see if the world would end. The living room was next: magazines stacked in descending order of size, the remote lined up with the angle of the coffee table, and coasters fanned outlike playing cards. Even the recliner—which I deliberately never returned to upright—had been restored to its anatomical zero.
I stood in the center of the rug, trying to slow my pulse. The lights in the house were all set to maximum, another Vivian tell. I preferred the dark, or at least the dark corners where no one could see in. She liked everything bright, exposed, like an operating room. I told myself she meant well.
That never worked.
The kitchen was next. She’d run the dishwasher, scrubbed the counters, rearranged the spice rack into alphabetical order, which I would have to reverse before breakfast or else lose my mind. A covered dish rested in the center of the table, and I lifted the lid to find a green bean casserole, the edges blackened just the way I hated. The microwave’s digital readout blinked “Enjoy!” which meant she’d programmed a custom message, then wiped the keypad clean with a Clorox wipe. She always left evidence, even when she tried not to.
My jaw clicked, a familiar grind. I considered throwing the casserole in the trash—Vivian hated waste, which made it a tempting act of rebellion—but instead I shoved it in the back of the fridge, behind the eggs. She’d rearranged those, too. Extra-large in front, medium in back, brown to white.
It was the kind of thing she pretended not to notice, but I’d seen her fix them in strangers’ homes, too. Once, at a dinner party, she’d excused herself to “use the restroom” and spent ten minutes alphabetizing the host’s pill bottles.
I shut the fridge with a little more force than necessary, and the door gave a satisfying thud. Still, it didn’t scratch the itch under my skin. I stalked through the house, flipping off lights as I went.
At the threshold of the bedroom, I froze. The sheets. Oh, god. She’d replaced my plain navy sheets—the only acceptable color, the one thing I’d managed to keep mine after the divorce—witha floral monstrosity. Poppies and pansies and little bluebells climbing in a riot of color across the bed. It was so bad it made my teeth itch.
“God damn it,” I said, low, and gripped the doorframe until my knuckles cracked.
I counted to five. The urge to text her something venomous passed, then circled back, and finally dissolved into a familiar, sour resignation. She would claim she was only helping. She always was.
I went to the dresser and pulled out my last set of navy sheets—the ones she’d probably meant to “launder properly” and then never bring back. I stripped the bed with surgical precision, folding the hated floral ones with a crispness that would have made my old drill instructor weep with pride. I stacked them, carried them to the laundry room, and shoved them into the donation bin, which I would drop off at the shelter on my next off day. If I didn’t, they’d start to multiply.
The whole time, I could hear her voice in my head, explaining how the old sheets were too scratchy, how the new ones would “lift your mood” and help you “let the past go.” It was a trick she’d learned from her therapist, weaponizing self-care into a kind of psychological carpet bombing.
After the divorce, she told the judge I was “addicted to routine,” as if being reliable was a kind of moral failing. She only used the word “obsessive” when she was trying to win, and she always, always wanted to win.
I went to the front door and checked the locks. Triple deadbolt, chain, smart pad, all still engaged. I’d taken her key months ago. She must have called the hardware store, claimed she was “Mrs. Hardesty,” and gotten a new copy. Again.
I leaned my forehead against the door, shut my eyes, and exhaled. “New locks,” I muttered. “Tomorrow.” The hardwarestore would be closed by now, but that was fine. It gave me something to look forward to.
I walked the perimeter of the house—my own ritual, a physical reminder that I was still in charge, still capable of keeping the chaos outside where it belonged. I checked the window latches, the basement door, the slider to the deck. Everything in its place, except for the intrusions she’d left behind. I made a mental list of what needed to be fixed. The list was the point. Lists were always the point.
Back in the bedroom, I remade the bed, corners squared off, pillows fluffed to exactly the right density. I adjusted the alarm clock by thirty seconds, just to feel the click of the dial. In the bathroom, I found a new bottle of “manly” body wash—something she’d once said she “liked the smell of”—placed exactly where my preferred unscented soap used to sit.
I threw it in the trash.
When I finally stripped out of my uniform and stood naked in the harsh light, I studied the man in the mirror. Not a trace of the day’s grime left, but my reflection still looked like someone had picked him up and shaken him hard. I flexed my jaw, watched the muscles jump, then ran a palm over the stubble on my chin. She’d trimmed my electric razor to the shortest guard, which meant she thought I looked “more approachable” clean-shaven. I left the stubble.
I left it out of spite.
I considered going back to the kitchen for a drink, but the thought of pouring bourbon into a glass she’d probably hand-polished killed the urge. I settled for water, drank it standing at the sink, and counted the heartbeats until my pulse went back to normal. Seventy-two. Not bad.
Upstairs, I sat on the edge of the bed, feeling the day leak out of me one muscle group at a time. The house was quiet, finally,except for the faint hum of the fridge and the soft click of the clock in the hallway.
I glanced at my phone, saw no new messages. Not from Vivian, not from Levi, and—because the universe had a sense of humor—nothing from Ransom McKenzie, either.
The sheets smelled like synthetic flowers, but under that was a trace of detergent—clean, sharp, almost enough to convince me things could go back to the way they used to be, before Vivian and before everything else.
I knew better. But sometimes you let yourself believe, if only for the length of a single breath.
Tomorrow, I’d change the locks. For tonight, I let myself drift, cataloging every flaw in the ceiling, counting down until I could close my eyes without seeing her face, or anyone else’s.
Order, then sleep.
Maybe, if I was lucky, a dream where nothing needed fixing.
I slid between the sheets, wincing as the fabric caught on the hairs of my thighs. Too new, too crisp, but I didn’t have the energy to fix it tonight. I lay flat on my back, arms folded over my chest like a corpse, and let the ceiling draw me out of my head. I counted the slow sweep of the fan blades, the distant hum of the fridge, the way the sheets felt wrong but clean.
I made it seven minutes before Ransom McKenzie crashed the gates.
