I woke the next morning to the sound of Dererick moving around downstairs.<\/p>\n
For a few seconds, I lay still and listened.<\/p>\n
A cupboard opened.<\/p>\n
Something was set on the counter.<\/p>\n
Then I heard the kettle being filled.<\/p>\n
I closed my eyes.<\/p>\n
I did not want to begin another day by treating ordinary sounds as warnings.<\/p>\n
I sat up and put my feet on the floor.<\/p>\n
The room was cool, and the boards felt cold beneath my toes.<\/p>\n
I pulled on a robe and went downstairs.<\/p>\n
Dererick stood at the counter, waiting for the kettle.<\/p>\n
\u201cMorning.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cMorning.\u201d<\/p>\n
He glanced at me.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou look like you need more sleep.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI probably do.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cCoffee?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNo, thanks.\u201d<\/p>\n
He looked toward the kettle.<\/p>\n
\u201cTea?\u201d<\/p>\n
The question came so naturally that I almost answered yes.<\/p>\n
I had drunk tea in that kitchen for years.<\/p>\n
It had been a small comfort, especially in the morning, when the day had not yet asked anything of me.<\/p>\n
Now I could feel the old hesitation rise before I spoke.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo, thank you.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dererick nodded and turned back to the counter.<\/p>\n
I hated that the answer had become difficult.<\/p>\n
I hated that he might have noticed.<\/p>\n
I hated most of all that I did not know whether I was protecting myself from something real or allowing an unexplained fear to make our home smaller.<\/p>\n
I poured myself a glass of water.<\/p>\n
The water ran clear from the tap, and I watched it settle in the glass.<\/p>\n
I drank half of it standing at the counter.<\/p>\n
Dererick carried his mug to the table.<\/p>\n
The chipped mug remained in the cupboard.<\/p>\n
I knew exactly where it was without looking.<\/p>\n
That knowledge had become almost physical.<\/p>\n
I could picture its worn rim and the small flaw near the base.<\/p>\n
I could picture the faint amber line that had remained after I poured out the tea, even though I had rinsed the mug and put it back.<\/p>\n
I had spent so long returning to that moment that I sometimes forgot what had happened before it.<\/p>\n
Dererick had made tea.<\/p>\n
He had joked that I looked at it as though I thought he had poisoned me.<\/p>\n
I had laughed, or tried to.<\/p>\n
Later, while he was upstairs brushing his teeth, I had poured the tea into the sink.<\/p>\n
I had not told him.<\/p>\n
The memory still made my stomach tighten.<\/p>\n
I could not pretend that my own secret did not matter simply because I was frightened by his.<\/p>\n
Dererick sat at the table and opened his phone.<\/p>\n
\u201cDo you want me to make you some toast?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNo, I'm okay.\u201d<\/p>\n
He looked up.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou sure?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYes.\u201d<\/p>\n
He returned to his phone.<\/p>\n
I stood by the counter, holding the empty glass.<\/p>\n
I wanted to tell him that I was tired of answering questions about whether I was okay when what I needed was to ask him one.<\/p>\n
But the thought sounded unfair when I put it into words.<\/p>\n
He was asking because he had noticed something.<\/p>\n
He might be worried about me.<\/p>\n
He might simply be making conversation.<\/p>\n
I did not know.<\/p>\n
I put the glass in the sink.<\/p>\n
Dererick finished his drink and stood.<\/p>\n
\u201cI'll be back later.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOkay.\u201d<\/p>\n
He came over and kissed my cheek.<\/p>\n
I turned my face toward him just enough to meet the gesture.<\/p>\n
He smiled.<\/p>\n
\u201cTry to get some rest today.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI will.\u201d<\/p>\n
After he left, I remained in the kitchen.<\/p>\n
I could hear his footsteps fading beyond the door, then the quiet of the house returning.<\/p>\n
I did not go to the window to watch him leave.<\/p>\n
I wanted to give myself one small break from looking for meaning in everything he did.<\/p>\n
Instead, I took the notebook from the drawer.<\/p>\n
I opened it to the three sentences I had written the day before.<\/p>\n
I saw Dererick put on gloves.<\/p>\n
He picked up a black bag.<\/p>\n
I do not know why.<\/p>\n
I read them slowly.<\/p>\n
The sentences were not an accusation.<\/p>\n
They were not proof of anything beyond what I remembered seeing.<\/p>\n
For the first time, I felt that I could hold those facts without immediately adding a frightening explanation.<\/p>\n
I sat at the table and wrote another sentence beneath them.<\/p>\n
I need to ask him what I saw.<\/p>\n
I put the pen down.<\/p>\n
The sentence looked almost embarrassingly simple.<\/p>\n
It did not tell me how to ask.<\/p>\n
It did not tell me what to do with his answer.<\/p>\n
It only reminded me that the next step was mine to take.<\/p>\n
I closed the notebook and returned it to the drawer.<\/p>\n
Then I opened the cupboard.<\/p>\n
The chipped mug stood where I had left it.<\/p>\n
I reached up and took it down.<\/p>\n
It felt ordinary in my hand.<\/p>\n
The handle was slightly rough where the glaze had worn away, and the rim had a small uneven place I could feel with my thumb.<\/p>\n
I turned it slowly beneath the kitchen light.<\/p>\n
There was nothing remarkable about it.<\/p>\n
No hidden mark.<\/p>\n
No sign that anything had happened inside it.<\/p>\n
I had known that already, but seeing it in my hand made the truth harder to avoid.<\/p>\n
The mug could not tell me what Dererick had done in the bedroom.<\/p>\n
It could not tell me why he wore gloves.<\/p>\n
It could not tell me what he carried in the black bag.<\/p>\n
I had wanted one object to connect all the pieces because I was afraid of what it meant to have no explanation.<\/p>\n
I washed the mug, though it was already clean.<\/p>\n
I dried it with the dish towel and placed it on the counter.<\/p>\n
For a moment, I considered putting it back in the cupboard.<\/p>\n
Instead, I set it on the table.<\/p>\n
I did not know why I chose to leave it there.<\/p>\n
Perhaps I wanted to stop hiding it from myself.<\/p>\n
Perhaps I simply wanted the next time I saw it to be an ordinary moment rather than another return to the night I poured the tea away.<\/p>\n
I made myself breakfast.<\/p>\n
I ate at the table with the mug beside me.<\/p>\n
I did not fill it.<\/p>\n
I did not need to.<\/p>\n
The rest of the day passed without any great change.<\/p>\n
I answered messages and finished the laundry.<\/p>\n
I went outside briefly to bring in something I had left near the door.<\/p>\n
When I came back inside, the mug was still on the table.<\/p>\n
I washed it again before putting it away.<\/p>\n
By evening, I felt tired in a different way.<\/p>\n
I had spent less time trying to imagine what Dererick might be doing and more time admitting what I did not know.<\/p>\n
That did not make me calm.<\/p>\n
It made the fear less tangled.<\/p>\n
When he came home, he asked how my day had been.<\/p>\n
\u201cQuiet,\u201d I said.<\/p>\n
\u201cDid you get some rest?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cA little.\u201d<\/p>\n
He set his keys down and looked at me.<\/p>\n
\u201cI'm glad.\u201d<\/p>\n
I wanted to tell him that rest had not solved anything.<\/p>\n
I wanted to tell him that I had been carrying a question around all day.<\/p>\n
Instead, I asked whether he wanted dinner soon.<\/p>\n
He said yes, and we began preparing it.<\/p>\n
I cut vegetables while he filled a pot with water.<\/p>\n
We worked without speaking for a few minutes.<\/p>\n
Then he reached for a spoon, and our hands nearly touched.<\/p>\n
I moved aside.<\/p>\n
He noticed.<\/p>\n
He did not make a joke this time.<\/p>\n
\u201cAre you sure you're okay?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n
I looked at him.<\/p>\n
The question was quiet.<\/p>\n
There was no accusation in it that I could hear, and no answer hidden in his expression that I could recognize.<\/p>\n
I was tired of saying yes when I did not know.<\/p>\n
\u201cI've been worried about something,\u201d I said.<\/p>\n
He put the spoon down.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat is it?\u201d<\/p>\n
My heart beat hard enough that I felt it in my throat.<\/p>\n
I could still retreat.<\/p>\n
I could say it was nothing.<\/p>\n
I could tell him I was only tired and let the moment pass as the others had passed.<\/p>\n
But I had already done that too many times.<\/p>\n
\u201cI saw something the other night,\u201d I said.<\/p>\n
He remained still, listening.<\/p>\n
I looked at his hands, then made myself look at his face.<\/p>\n
\u201cI saw you wearing gloves in the bedroom.\u201d<\/p>\n
The words were out.<\/p>\n
They sounded smaller than they had in my head.<\/p>\n
Dererick did not answer immediately.<\/p>\n
I could hear the water beginning to simmer in the pot.<\/p>\n
I waited.<\/p>\n
He looked at me, and I could not tell what he was thinking.<\/p>\n
I did not add the bag.<\/p>\n
I did not mention the tea.<\/p>\n
I did not tell him what I feared.<\/p>\n
I had finally said what I knew.<\/p>\n
Now I had to let him respond.<\/p>\n
I woke the next morning to the sound of Dererick moving around downstairs. For a few seconds, I lay still and listened. A cupboard opened. Something was set on the … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":36711,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-36723","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-insightdrama"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36723","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=36723"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36723\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":36743,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36723\/revisions\/36743"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/36711"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=36723"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=36723"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=36723"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}