What the Dog Knew First

The golden retriever had stopped greeting him at the door three weeks ago, which Elena had noted with the quiet precision of someone cataloguing the end of a marriage. Dogs knew these things before humans did. They could smell the absence on a person's clothes, the other woman's perfume clinging to wool coats like an accusation.

Tonight, David was late again. The spinach sat wilting in the colander, planned for a salad they wouldn't eat together. Elena stood at the kitchen counter, her hands methodically tearing the leaves, watching them grow darker in the bowl. She'd started buying organic spinach the year they married—David's insistence, his sudden commitment to longevity after his father's heart attack. Now the spinach rotted weekly, a small green memorial to the man he used to be.

She counted out his vitamins: Vitamin D for his bones (he'd read somewhere it helped with mood), Vitamin B12 for energy, CoQ10 because a podcast mentioned it. The morning ritual of handing him his daily packet had become another form of touching they'd abandoned without discussing it.

The front door opened. The dog remained curled on the rug, ears lifting once, then settling back into sleep. David entered carrying the scent of rain and gin and something else—jasmine, maybe? No woman Elena knew wore jasmine anymore.

"Sorry," he said, not looking at her. "Happy hour ran long."

"Spinach is ready," she said.

"Not hungry, actually. Think I'll just head up."

He didn't take his vitamins. He didn't pet the dog. He didn't seem to notice Elena had stopped wearing her wedding ring two days ago, or that the dog had known everything was over before either of them had admitted it aloud.

Some mornings you wake up and realize love is just another vitamin you thought was keeping you alive, but you've been living without it for months and haven't died at all.