“That's one way to describe having a boundary.”
Ryan was quiet. “Just don't let pride make the decision for you.”
I almost told him about the lawyer. Something kept me from doing it. It wasn't suspicion yet, only a new sense that not every thought needed to be spoken aloud, even to someone I loved. I thanked him for calling and ended the conversation.
On Thursday, one week after she'd left, I woke to clear sunlight across the bedroom floor. I'd slept for seven hours. It was the first time I hadn't dreamed of Natalie returning with an apology that changed halfway through into an argument. I made eggs, ran the dishwasher, and drove to the office without checking the location services app we used to share. I had disabled the shared location that morning after realizing I'd opened it twice in the night. It wasn't a punishment. I simply didn't want to spend my days following a small moving dot around a map.
At work I attended the crew meeting, asked Tessa about the certifications she wanted to complete, and spent an hour with Luis solving a difficult drainage problem in a customer's basement. When the day was over, I went to the grocery store. I bought milk, as Natalie had requested on the sticky note, but I also bought food I actually liked: olives she hated, spicy sausage she couldn't stand, and the kind of crusty bread she'd always said made too many crumbs. It was a ridiculous act of independence, and it felt unexpectedly good.
That night I cooked for one and ate at the kitchen island. Afterward, I walked upstairs and opened the closet. Natalie's clothes still hung on one side in neat rows. I didn't touch them. Instead, I moved the photograph from my bedside table into a drawer and changed the sheets. It was a small distinction, but it mattered to me. I wasn't erasing our history or throwing away her possessions. I was making enough room to sleep without feeling watched by a memory.
On Friday, day eight, I made the decision I'd been circling. I called Leah Bennett and asked her to proceed with the divorce petition. She didn't sound surprised. She asked whether I understood what filing meant and reminded me that I could still negotiate terms without abandoning the choice to divorce. I told her I understood. Then I signed the engagement documents and began gathering account statements, tax returns, the house papers, and our marriage certificate. I was surprised by how much of a life could be represented by numbers on pages.
That afternoon Priya stopped by my office with a report I'd requested. She set a neat stack of documents on the desk, then remained standing. Priya had worked with us for six years and had an almost supernatural ability to notice numbers that didn't belong where they appeared. She was younger than Ryan and me, with quick eyes and a dry sense of humor, and she usually dealt with uncomfortable information by presenting it in a way nobody could misunderstand.
“Before you look at this, I need to ask you something,” she said. “Has Ryan been traveling for business this month?”
“I don't think so. Why?”
“He coded two hotel charges and several restaurant expenses as client development. The descriptions don't match the project schedule.”
“Could they be for Westbridge?”
“He says they are. But one charge was in Cincinnati on Friday night, and another was for a hotel in Nashville beginning Monday. We don't have projects in either city.”
A small, irrational alarm went off inside me. Cincinnati was where I'd thought I'd seen Natalie in that restaurant photograph. Nashville meant nothing to me except that it was a city she liked, one she'd visited with college friends years earlier. Both were places a businessperson might plausibly visit. I didn't want to let pain turn a bookkeeping discrepancy into an accusation.
“Ask him for receipts,” I said.
“I did. He told me to stop worrying about nickel-and-dime expenses and finalize the monthly statements.”