Better Off Alone

Chapter 6

(Rebecca's POV)

That night, I sleep at Connie's apartment.

She gives me a blanket and a glass of milk. She doesn't ask questions, which is how I know she's been waiting for this night for years. Connie is that kind of friend. The kind who sharpens her knives quietly and hands them to you only when you're finally ready to cut.

When I wake up in the morning, she's already gone. There's a note on the counter in her terrible handwriting: Divorce papers printed. On the kitchen table. Go get your stuff. Call me if he tries anything. I mean it.

I pick up the envelope. It's thick. Official. My name is on it, and Sean's, and between those two names, the clean legal language that will undo six years of my life. I press it against my chest for a second, eyes closed. It doesn't feel like freedom. It sits like a brick.

But I take it with me because if I don't put down this weight anytime soon, I'll have to carry it for life.

The last thing I want to carry now is an unnecessary weight.

The house is empty again when I get there. Sean's car is gone. Jack's shoes aren't by the door. Even the leftover birthday decorations have been taken down—someone swept the streamers away, popped the balloons, removed the painting. As if the party never happened, and I dreamed the whole thing.

I go upstairs. Our bedroom—his bedroom; I need to start saying that—is exactly as I left it. Bed made with hospital corners because Sean likes it tight. Pillows firm because Sean has neck problems. Curtains drawn halfway because he likes the room dim in the morning. His watch on the nightstand, lined up parallel to the edge the way he insists. Every surface in this room is arranged around his comfort. Even the air.

I don't realize that until I open the closet and pull out my suitcase. The whole house — every corner, every inch— smells like the lavender fabric softener I use on the sheets. The lemon cleaner I wipe the counters with. The jasmine candle I keep on the living room shelf because Sean once said he liked it. He said it once. Four years ago. I've been replacing that candle every three months since.

I throw my suitcase open on the bed and start packing.

It doesn't take long. That's the thing no one tells you about leaving a six-year marriage — when you've spent those years shrinking yourself to fit someone else's life, you don't have much to pack. My clothes. A few books. My laptop. A photo of Jack from the hospital the day he was born, his face red and scrunched, my hand under his head. I slip that one between two sweaters so the glass won't crack.

The rest of it — the furniture, the dishes, the art on the walls — none of it is mine.

I move to the bathroom. My toothbrush. My face wash. The prescription cream for my hands. Eczema. That's what the dermatologist called it.

She looked at my cracked, bleeding hands and asked if I'd been exposed to excessive moisture, and I almost laughed.

The humidifiers.

I'd placed them in every room—the bedroom, the living room, the nursery, the study, even the hallway—because dry air makes Sean's sinuses flare up. Dry air makes Jack cough at night. So I bought humidifiers. Seven of them. One for every room. I filled them, cleaned them, scrubbed out the mineral buildup every week with a tiny brush until my hands were raw because if you don't, bacteria grows in the water and gets into the mist and then what's the point.

The moisture in the air made my skin split open. I tried lotions. I tried gloves. I tried switching brands. Nothing worked. The doctor said the only real fix was to remove the constant exposure to damp, but I couldn't do that, because Sean needed the humidifiers and Jack needed the humidifiers and nobody cared enough to ask why my skin was cracking.

So I bought the cream. And I kept filling the humidifiers. And I kept scrubbing them every Sunday while Sean watched football in the living room and Jack napped on Hannah's gifted stuffed wolf.

I throw the moisturizer into the suitcase harder than I need to.

The study is next. I kept a shelf in here—one shelf, bottom row, out of the way—where I stored my own books. Engineering textbooks from Stanford University. A binder of notes from Luke's lab. A journal I started in my first year of marriage, where I wrote down everything I did for Sean and Jack each day. Not because anyone asked me to, but because I needed proof. Proof that I existed here. That I wasn't just furniture.

I flip it open. The first entry is dated six years ago, the week after our wedding.

Made Sean's coffee. Black, no sugar, 190 degrees. Sean texted at 6pm to ask what was for dinner. Made steak, medium-rare. He ate in the study. I ate alone.

I close the journal. I put it in the suitcase.

I move through the house like a ghost undoing its own haunting. The living room, where I arranged fresh flowers every Monday because Sean once said the place felt stale. The hallway, where I hung Jack's school photos in frames I picked out myself.

I take the photos down. I leave the empty hooks on the wall.

In the kitchen, I open the pantry. Sean's favorite tea is on the second shelf — the loose-leaf oolong I order from a shop in Portland because they're the only ones that carry the specific blend he likes. I used to steep it for exactly four minutes. Not three, not five. Four. Then I'd carry it to his office on a small tray with a napkin folded in a triangle. When I finally got the taste down he said, "It's fine," and kept scrolling through his phone.

He never said thank you. Not once in six years.

I close the pantry.

In the laundry room, his shirts are hanging on the drying rack. I ironed five of them before I left for California. Laid them out in order — Monday through Friday — with the creases pressed exactly where he likes them, the collars stiff, the cuffs folded. I even put a small sticky note on Monday's shirt that said Have a good week with a little smiley face.

The sticky note is still there. He wore the shirt and didn't peel it off. Or he never saw it. I'm not sure which is worse.

I pull the note off and crumple it in my fist.