What We Leave Behind

The living room was smaller than I remembered. Or maybe it was just filled with more boxes now.

Margot sat on the floor, sorting through years of accumulated life. She held up an orange sweater I'd bought her in Barcelona, back when we still believed in spontaneous trips and forever. The color was too bright for the grey afternoon filtering through the windows.

"This was yours," she said, not handing it to me. Just stating a fact, like she'd tell a stranger the weather.

I watched her from the doorway, my hands shoved in my pockets. We'd been married seven years, friends for twelve before that. That word—friend—kept echoing in my head. How easily it had slipped away, replaced by something heavier, then something else entirely. Now we were strangers who happened to know each other's coffee orders and which drawer the spare keys were in.

The dog, Barnaby, lay in the hallway between us like a furry, indifferent border guard. He'd stopped crying when the shouting started weeks ago. Now he just followed whoever happened to be walking toward the kitchen. He was hers in the divorce papers. Another thing I'd leave behind.

"Do you want the cable subscription?" I asked, because small talk was easier than the real conversation we'd been avoiding for months. "I can cancel it or transfer—"

"Keep it." She didn't look up. "I won't be watching much TV anyway."

The cable box sat dark on the shelf, another lifeline we'd paid to distract ourselves from what was happening in our own living room. I thought about all the nights we'd sat side by side on the couch, bathed in its blue light, letting fictional characters' problems drown out our own.

I should say something. Should apologize or fight or beg, but my throat felt closed. Instead I watched her fold the orange sweater and place it in a box marked "DONATION."

"I'm taking the dog to the park later," she said, finally looking at me. "If you wanted to say goodbye."

I nodded, not trusting myself to speak. Barnaby thumped his tail against the floorboards, once, like punctuation.

In my car later, with my half of the boxes packed in the back, I caught sight of something orange in the rearview mirror. Marget's sweater, which I'd stolen when she wasn't looking. Childish, maybe. But it was something.