Seven Years and a Sunflower

After that, I started packing.

It was already night by the time Reuben got home.

He walked in and dropped onto the couch without so much as glancing back at me.

Not until I rolled my suitcase past him.

Only then did he frown and ask, irritated,

"It's this late. Where do you think you're going?"

I slapped the divorce papers down on the table and told him to sign.

He flipped through a few pages without much interest, then looked up.

"Could you at least make it more convincing? If you really wanted a divorce, would you ever give up this place?"

I froze.

I had poured so much of myself into this home.

The location, the floor, all of it chosen with care.

When we renovated, I went to every building-supply store in the city.

The color of the couch, the style of the curtains, I compared more than thirty places before deciding.

Even the spice rack in the kitchen, I picked each one out by hand, dragging Reuben along.

The day we moved in, we lay in bed and neither of us could sleep.

I held him from behind, my voice catching, and said,

"We have a home now."

But then Bonnie came by once, and a few throw pillows she liked appeared on the couch.

Then the curtains were swapped for that off-white lace cutout I never liked.

On the bathroom counter, her skincare slowly outnumbered mine.

Now even the slippers had little antlers on them.

I don't know when it happened, but this home was full of her everywhere I looked.

I looked for a long moment, then said quietly,

"It's tainted. I don't want it. Keep it, you and Bonnie."

The second I said Bonnie's name.

His face darkened, and his voice went cold.

"Marie, there's a limit to how much trouble you get to make."

"I've told you a thousand times. Bonnie and I are just friends. There is nothing between us, nothing at all."

"Keep your ugly little theories to yourself. She's done nothing wrong."

The same words, said a thousand times.

He was innocent.

Bonnie was innocent.

The only filthy mind here was mine.

I had no patience left for any of it.

"Sign."

We stood there facing each other for a long time.

He signed with a cold face, threw the pen down on the table, and looked up at me.

"Fine. It's signed."

"Let's see how long you last. Don't come crawling back to me."

My answer was the door slamming hard behind me.

Once I was out of the complex, I flagged down a car and gave the name of a hotel.

On my phone, I started looking into tour groups to Iceland.

I had waited seven years for Reuben. That was enough.

Some roads you have to walk on your own.

That night, I slept more soundly than I had in a long time.

The next morning, I went down for breakfast.

I'd just picked up a plate when someone behind me called out,

"Marie?"

It was Bonnie.

My stomach dropped, and sure enough, when I turned, Reuben was standing in the doorway.

Bonnie glanced at me and said to him,

"Reuben, you brought your wife along to a work conference? No wonder you were murmuring sweet nothings in your sleep last night."

Reuben's expression turned awkward.

"She came on her own."

Bonnie smiled at me, sweet as anything.

"So Marie came to keep tabs on you?"

She didn't wait for me to answer. She turned back to him.

"Then again, can't blame her. A man built like you… honestly, what woman could ever relax?"

She made it sound offhand, but every word was meant to remind me.

That she and Reuben shared an ease, a private joke, that I would never be part of.

I stood there and said nothing.

Reuben swept his eyes over me, a cold smile curling at his mouth.

"Marie, couldn't even hold out a single day before running here to beg? Hm?"

He thought I'd been following him.

I gave a small smile.