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.”
I looked up. “He said that to you?”
“Almost word for word.”
“Don't finalize them yet. Keep the original entries. I'll speak to him.”
She hesitated. “There are some larger expenses I want an accountant to review before they get folded into the Westbridge proposal.”
“How much larger?”
“Not enough to sink us. Enough that I don't want to pretend I didn't see them.”