Chapter 2

The day I was discharged, I took a cab home alone.

I pushed open the door, and the nursery I'd put together so carefully had become a dog den.

The crib I'd spent three days assembling with my own hands, the little socks and little clothes folded into neat stacks, all of it was gone.

Angela and Matthew Fox were bent head to head, toweling off a puppy.

"Who said you could touch my nursery?"

I'd spent three months setting up that room.

A lot of it Angela said we didn't need, so I'd paid for every bit of it alone.

Matthew spoke first.

"The dog just gave birth and she's weak. Angela said your daughter's still too little to need the nursery yet, so we borrowed it for a while to help her recover."

Angela stood up, her tone like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

"It'd just sit empty and go to waste. Might as well let Matthew use it."

Anger churned up in me. "Did you ask me first? Where are all the baby things that were in that room?"

Matthew put on an innocent face. "Angela said a lot of it wasn't needed for now, so I threw it out for you."

"Rupert, you're not going to be this stingy, are you?"

Angela stepped in front of him, shielding him.

"Rupert, that's enough. You come home and the first thing you do is put us on trial."

"Matthew was kind enough to help clean up, and you throw that look at him?"

My child's things. Never used, not even once, and they threw them out without asking.

"They can be used. But then we settle up by the rules."

"The baby things I bought before were all brand new. You moved them and damaged them without permission, so you pay me full price."

"Also, for occupying the room, we bill by the day."

Angela's face went dark.

"Rupert, can you not nickel-and-dime everything?"

"The room sits empty anyway. Matthew's only borrowing it for a while, and you're going to calculate a little rent off him?"

I held her hypocritical face in my stare, a mocking curl at the corner of my mouth.

"You're the one who always wanted rules with me, splitting everything down the middle, equal."

"Eight years married. Rent split, utilities split, groceries split."

"Even when my gastritis was so bad I couldn't eat, the leftovers got counted as my waste."

"You taught me the rules. What's wrong with me following them now?"

I'd left her with nothing to say, and it made her flush with anger.

"That's not the same. Matthew's like a real brother to me."

"He's got no one to lean on in this city. What's wrong with me looking after him a little?"

"You're my husband, and to him you're the younger brother — you should give a little and be understanding."

Listening to her, all I felt was how absurd it was.

"When our daughter and I were in a car crash you made me pay it myself, but his dog whelps and you drop thirty-eight hundred without blinking."

"Angela, your double standard is truly sickening."

"Our daughter is gone now—"

Before I could finish, Matthew cut in, dropping his head like the wronged one.

"Rupert, it's all my fault. Please, don't fight."

"I shouldn't have troubled Angela, I shouldn't have taken your room, but Mochi and her pups are living things too..."

And with that he scooped up Mochi and ran out.

Angela rounded on me sharply.

"Rupert, that's enough! When did you turn into such a petty, impossible little penny-pincher?"

"Matthew sat up with Mochi through the birth. He's barely rested these past few days. Can't you show a little consideration?"

I wanted to say our daughter was still in the morgue. I wanted to say I was the one injured in the crash, weaker than any of them. I wanted to ask why she couldn't show me any consideration.

But the words came to my lips, and I swallowed them back down.

With someone who doesn't love you, no matter how much you say, it's just making a scene.

The front door slammed. Angela had gone chasing after Matthew.

From school uniforms to a wedding dress, eight years, and I'd honored her so-called splitting-everything, her equality.

When she ran a fever I sat up three days and three nights. That didn't count for money.

When my gastritis was so bad I couldn't eat, she asked whether the leftover food could be counted as my personal waste.

I pulled a ledger out of the drawer, every day's expenses recorded line by line.

Small as a twenty-cent plastic bag, large as rent, utilities, the mortgage.

I had eight of these books.

I turned to the last page, picked up a pen, and added a line.

"Daughter's funeral costs, $8,600, borne by Rupert alone."

Our eight years of marriage ended here too.