The Storm Before Leaving

Anna stood before the bathroom mirror, scissors poised, her reflection blurred by steam. Richard was asleep in the next room, his breathing rhythmic and oblivious. They'd fought again — about nothing, about everything — and somewhere between his accusations of her coldness and her own exhaustion, she'd decided: this would be the last night.

Her hair fell to the tile in dark coils. Richard had always loved it long, had always buried his hands in it during sex, using it like reins. Another thing for him to control. She watched the dark pile accumulate like something sacrificed.

Outside, lightning fractured the sky, and the power died. The house went silent except for rain hammering the roof. Anna moved to the window, barefoot on cold floors, watching the backyard pool churn in the storm. The water looked alive, violent and free.

She'd learned to swim last year at thirty-seven, shamefully late, because Richard's friends all vacationed at beach houses and she'd tired of inventing excuses. The instructor had been kind, older, with gentle hands that corrected her form without lingering. You carry too much tension, he'd said. Let the water hold you.

A flash of white caught her eye beneath the gardenia bush. Richard's cat, a haughty Persian named Duchess, was huddled against the foundation, soaked and miserable. The creature despised Anna, had hissed at her since the day they'd moved in together — Richard's loyal sentinel.

Anna opened the door, rain instantly plastering her nightgown to her skin. She gathered the shivering animal into her arms, Duchess too shocked to protest. The cat's heart hammered against Anna's chest, a frantic second heartbeat. For once, there was no resistance.

She brought Duchess inside and toweled her dry by the light of a vanilla candle, the cat's yellow eyes fixed on her with something that looked almost like recognition. Perhaps they were both just things that didn't belong here anymore.

In the bedroom, Richard stirred. "Anna? What's going on?"

She looked at her husband through the doorway, then at the cat in her arms, at the short-haired stranger in her reflection in the darkened window. Something about the storm had burned away the last of her hesitation.

"Nothing," she said, and it was true. "Go back to sleep."

Duchess purred against her chest, a small, traitorous engine in the dark. Anna watched the lightning splinter the sky again and felt something like freedom stirring in her chest, terrifying and electric as the storm.