The next evening, I tried to behave like the woman I had been before the tea began to trouble me.
I washed the dinner plates, wiped the counter, and folded the dish towel over the handle of the oven.
Dererick stood near the refrigerator, looking for something he had forgotten he wanted.
“Have you seen my charger?”
“On the table by the couch.”
He found it there and smiled.
“Of course.”
I smiled back because that was what I would have done before.
Nothing about the exchange was unusual.
That was what made the rest so difficult.
I could not point to a cruel word or a strange demand and say that everything had changed because of it.
I had only the gloves, the black bag, and the memory of watching my husband move around our bedroom while I pretended to be asleep.
After dinner, he asked if I wanted tea.
“No, thank you.”
“You sure?”
“I’m sure.”
He looked at me for a moment, then put the kettle away from the edge of the counter.
“All right.”
I hated how relieved I felt when he did not insist.
I also hated that I had begun to treat an ordinary question as something I needed to survive.
We watched television together that night.
The room was dim except for the screen, and the old blanket lay across both our legs.
Dererick laughed at something a man on the show said.
I laughed a second later, mostly because I understood the joke and partly because I wanted to prove to myself that I could still do it.
He reached for the remote.
I passed it to him without looking at his hand.
The little movements of our life continued around me, familiar and almost comforting.
When the program ended, he yawned and stretched.
“I’m tired.”
“Me too.”
He turned off the television, and we went upstairs.
I changed into my nightclothes while he brushed his teeth.
The bathroom light shone beneath the door.
I heard the tap run, stop, then run again.
I stood beside the bed and looked at the place where he usually set his phone.
There was nothing there except a small crease in the bedspread.
I told myself not to turn every ordinary object into evidence.
That was the rule I tried to follow.
Notice what happened.
Do not decide what it meant before you knew.
When Dererick came back into the bedroom, he wore the same tired expression he had worn the night before.
He pulled back the covers and climbed into bed.
“Good night,” he said.
“Good night.”
He kissed my forehead.
I closed my eyes after he settled beside me.
For a while, I listened to his breathing and the distant hum of the refrigerator downstairs.
I did not know whether I was waiting for him to sleep or waiting for myself to become brave enough to look.
Eventually, I heard the familiar change in his breathing that usually meant he had drifted off.
I kept my eyes closed.
Minutes passed.
Then more minutes.
The room became so quiet that I could hear the faint movement of fabric when I shifted my foot beneath the blanket.
I wanted to turn toward him.
I wanted to ask him a simple question.
I wanted to say, “What are you doing with that bag?”
Instead, I lay still.
I had spent so much time imagining what he might say that I had forgotten I could ask and receive an answer I had not predicted.
The clock changed numbers.
I could not see the display without turning my head, but I knew where it stood on the bedside table.
I waited for the sound I remembered from the other night.
A drawer opening.
A quiet rustle.
The faint snap of something being pulled over a hand.
Nothing came.
Dererick remained beside me.
I heard him breathe out, then shift onto his side.
For one foolish second, I felt disappointed.
The feeling embarrassed me immediately.
I did not want anything to happen.
I wanted to know what had already happened.
There was a difference, even if my fear had begun to blur it.
I waited a little longer, then opened my eyes.
The room was dark.
Dererick's outline was visible beneath the blanket, his shoulder turned away from me.
I looked toward the dresser.
The top was difficult to make out, but I could see the pale shape of a folded shirt and the darker rectangle of a book.
I saw no bag.
I did not know whether it was somewhere else in the room or whether he had put it away.
I turned onto my back and stared at the ceiling.
My body felt heavy, but my thoughts would not settle.
I remembered the way his gloves had caught the faint light when he stood near the bed.
I remembered how carefully he had moved.
I remembered the black bag hanging from his hand.
I could remember every detail of that scene and still understand almost nothing about it.
That was the part I had been trying to escape.
I wanted the memory to give me a conclusion.
It gave me only itself.
At some point, I must have slept.
When I woke, daylight had reached the curtains, and Dererick was already out of bed.
I sat up slowly.
For a moment, I could not remember why I felt so tired.
Then I remembered the night and the waiting.
I pressed my palms against my eyes.
I was beginning to feel worn down by a fear that had no proper shape.
Downstairs, I found Dererick standing at the counter with two slices of bread beside the toaster.
“Morning,” he said.
“Morning.”
“You sleep any better?”
“A little.”
It was not entirely true, but it was not entirely false either.
He placed the toast on a plate and asked whether I wanted some.
I said yes.
We ate at the kitchen table.
The chipped mug sat in the cupboard above the counter, out of sight.
I did not open the cupboard.
I did not need to see it to remember what I had done.
Dererick talked about the day ahead, mentioning a few ordinary things he needed to take care of.
I listened and answered when he paused.
Nothing in his voice told me whether he knew how little I had slept.
Nothing in his face gave me an answer about the bag.
I realized I had been searching him for signs of guilt, as though guilt had a fixed expression.
I had no reason to believe it did.
I also had no reason to believe that a calm face meant everything was fine.
I finished my toast and carried my plate to the sink.
Dererick rinsed his mug and placed it on the drying rack.
The sound of ceramic touching metal made me look up.
He glanced at me.
“Everything okay?”
“Yes,” I said.
The word came out too quickly.
He waited, perhaps expecting me to say something else.
I almost did.
I nearly asked him about the gloves.
Instead, I turned on the tap and watched the water run over my plate.
I was not ready to hear an answer I might not know how to handle.
I understood that waiting could become its own kind of decision.
I understood that I could not live forever by watching his hands and measuring his silences.
But understanding something and being able to do it were not the same.
That morning, I dried the plate, put it away, and went about the day.
I carried the question with me.
I did not let it become an answer.
Click here to continue reading: PART 10: The Question I Kept Swallowing Sat Between Us at Breakfast, Even When We Spoke About Everything Except the Thing I Wanted to Know
At Two Seventeen, I Watched My Husband Cross Our Bedroom in Gloves, Carrying Something I Had Never Seen Before
Part 9 of 20
