It’snice. Being in a space where I’m not constantly bracing for someone’s disappointment. Where I don’t feel like I have to clean the kitchen just to justify my existence. Where I don’t have to quietly resent the invisible scorekeeping of a man who believed being married was the same thing as being owed.
I step into the kitchen, loosening my hair from its low chignon and groaning when the elastic pulls out a few strands. There’s a note on the counter, written in Skye’s ‘serial killer’ scrawl (get her to explain) on the back of a grocery receipt:
Ran to the store. Out of dish soap. Don’t you dare cook anything without me. Be back asap. —S
I laugh, the tension in my chest loosening just a little. Of course she left a note. Of course it’s bossy. And of course she wants me to wait to cook dinnerwithher like the domestic goddesses we are not.
She’s a disaster. But she’smydisaster.
And she cares. Not performatively. Not for credit. Not with some expectation of sex or praise or repayment. She just… shows up.
And damn, does that give me life.
I reach into the cabinet and pull down a tumbler. Two fingers of whiskey, a splash of sour mix, and a twist of orange, if I’m feeling fancy. I’m not tonight.
I drop in a half-melted ice cube and take a long, slow sip, letting the heat bloom across my tongue before trailing down to my chest.
I pad barefoot into the bathroom, switch on the light, and start the water in the tub. My body is screaming in places I forgot had nerve endings.
Who knew two months of unemployment and binge-watching true crime documentaries wouldn’t keep me in pumps-for-hours shape?
As the tub fills, I catch my reflection in the mirror.
I look… different.
Not bad, exactly. Justtired. A little softer in the face, a little more hollow around the eyes. I look like someone starting over. Someone trying to believe that starting over is still allowed at thirty-two.
I stare at myself a beat too long, then shake it off and go to light the candle on the back of the toilet—Skye’s “Pumpkin Ember” from her lifetime supply—and slide out of my clothes.
By the time I sink into the water, the day finally starts to unravel.
I think about Dr. Johnson. About his warmth and kindness. About how I didn’t realize just how starved I was for that kind of basic decency until it was handed to me so freely.
I think about Leo and his glare and the way he saidyou’re the one who ditched her husbandlike it was a fact and not his own assumption. Like it was something shameful instead of something necessary.
My stomach clenches again remembering it.
I don’t know why his opinion bothers me so much. I don’t owe him anything. And yet… it hits different when the judgment comes from someone who’s barely spoken to you.
Who doesn’t even know what they don’t know.
Still. I’m not backpedaling. I’m not explaining. Let him think what he wants. He’ll either come around or he won’t. My years of trying to fix people have come and gone.
I soak until my fingers prune and the candle flickers low.
Then, from the other room, I hear the unmistakable clatter of grocery bags and the sound of Skye singing off-key.
“Guess who got Thaiiiiiiii foooooood!” she warbles.
I smile. Really smile. Not the kind I forced at the university today.
The kind of smile that feels like home.
I toweloff and throw on an oversized sleep shirt—Skye’s, actually. One of her old band tees she refuses to part with. The sleeves hang past my elbows, and the collar’s been cut so wide it drapes off my shoulder.
I catch a glimpse of myself in the hallway mirror and laugh. I look like someone’s girlfriend. And for once, maybe that’s not a miserable thought.
Pfft. As if. This is my self-love era.
