I head straight upstairs, take a hurried shower, and change into a fresh shirt.
The water is hot. The soap is sharp. I scrub my skin until it is pink and abraded, trying to wash away the last traces of Briana. The last traces of the man I was this afternoon.
I dress carefully. A clean button-up shirt. Stiff and crisp with starch. Fresh pants. I comb my hair. I check my reflection in the medicine cabinet mirror. In the pallid light of the bathroom, and the clean clothes, I look like a man who has never done anything wrong in his entire life.
I trot into the kitchen, the bouquet held like an offering. A libation for the ghost haunting my house.
“Nora?”
The room is still.
The stove is off, the counters wiped down. No chopping sounds, no simmering pots. No water gurgling in the sink. No towel draped over her thin shoulder. No small, steady presence at the counter, stirring something in a pot.
An unusual silence hangs in the air.
Maybe she’s on the balcony.
I check.
It’s empty.
The chairs are pushed in. The table is bare. The door is closed.
Maybe she’s in the laundry room.
Also empty. The dryer is cool. The basket is empty. The detergent is on the shelf, the cap closed, the measuring cup dry.
A slow, cold dread begins to creep up my body, a thread of frost through my veins.
I walk back to our bedroom, my steps heavier.
The door is open. The bed is made. The curtains are drawn. Everything is in its place. Everything is exactly as it should be.
But something is wrong.
My eyes catch on a splash of yellow against the dark wood of my desk.
A Post-it note.
In her handwriting.
My body goes rigid, the muscles in my back locking into a painful grip.
The flowers fall from my numb fingers.
Paper crinkles as they hit the floor. Waxy white petals scatter across the rug like baby teeth. Stems snap. The sound is small, almost nothing, but in the silence of the room, it is a deafening blow to my eardrums.
It is all that I can hear.
My entire world has narrowed to that small, square piece of paper.
It’s too small. A small and pathetic scrap. It shouldn’t hold this much weight.
But it does.
It holds everything.
My hands tremble as I reach for it.
