HE KNEW
“David, I’m tired,” I whispered.
“I know.”
“You don’t know.”
“Then tell me.”
I looked around my apartment.
Everything was exactly where I’d left it that morning.
The dishes.
The unopened mail.
The jacket hanging over the chair.
A photograph of my family on the shelf.
Nothing looked different.
But I felt completely different.
“I don’t think I can keep doing this,” I finally said.
There was another silence.
This time, David didn’t rush to fill it.
He simply stayed on the phone.
“I don’t need you to explain everything tonight,” he said. “Just don’t be alone.”
“I don’t want anyone seeing me like this.”
“Then don’t let them see you. Let me sit with you.”
I wiped my face.
“You’d really come?”
“I’m already outside.”
I froze.
“What?”
“I told you,” he said. “You don’t have to explain everything.”
I walked toward the window.
There he was.
Standing beneath the streetlight.
And that’s when I realized something I had forgotten.
Sometimes people notice the things you think you’ve hidden perfectly.
