I am standing in my own kitchen, speaking to my wife.
And I cannot find her anywhere.
Nora sets the knife down. Wipes her hands on the towel, one hand, then the other, and turns back to the vegetables.
Just like that, I have been set aside.
I take a step closer. The air feels thin, useless in my lungs. “Nora. Please.” My voice has nothing left in it. “We need to talk about what happened.”
She tilts her head—not toward me. Toward the carrot she’s sizing up on the board, as if its dimensions require her full attention.
“Why?” she asks.
My lungs seize in my chest.
“Because yousawme.” It tears out of me. And then the rest of it—allof it—spilling forward before I can find any dignified way to hold it back. “You saw what happened. I need to explain. I’m sorry. I’ll end it—it’s already over, I swear to you. Briana means nothing. She never meant anything. It’s only you. It has always beenonlyyou, Nora, please—”
The kitchen is very quiet.
She lifts her gaze to mine.
I search her eyes for the thing I need—the hurt, the recognition, the proof that the words I have run out of have landed somewhere, that she is still in there receiving them.
Her eyes are clear. Empty in a way that has very little to do with pain.
“Okay,” she says.
Just that. One word, and she places it down as gently as the knife.
My jaw slackens. The rest of my speech—every word queued behind my teeth, every promise, every assurance—dies without a sound.
Okay.
Nothow could you.Notget out.
Okay.
One word that costs her nothing. One word that gives me nothing.
I wait for the rest of it.
There is no rest of it.
She reaches for a carrot and picks up the knife again.
“I’m not lying, Nora. I will never do anything like that again. I love you. I’m sorry.”
“Okay.”
The same word. The same tone. The carrot shortens by another inch by the slice of the knife.
“Nora.” My voice is climbing my throat, hot and sharp. Words like shards of glass against wet flesh. “I’m telling you the truth.”
She looks up at me, and her gaze is so clear and bright, it’s almost unbearable. It’s like looking into the abyss. “I believe you.”
A knot in my chest loosens. One painful degree, one thread of hope pulling taut—
“I believe you’re sorry,” she continues, the words unhurried, her eyes already drifting back to the carrot. “And I believe you won’t do it again. So that’s it. Nothing else to discuss.”
