Finding Dawn32

Eight years. She makes your coffee before you're up. She learned your grandmother's cinnamon rolls from nothing but your description of them. She's the one who remembers which of your coworkers can't be seated together. You built a life, and she built hers around it, and it was good. It is good. Then the Marcettis moved in next door. Olivia; loud, blunt, a little too alive for the street, and Hector, who always has his head under a hood. And somewhere in the last three months, your wife started coming home late. Not every night. That's the thing. Some nights she's exactly where she's always been; dinner on, porch light on, the mug already out. And some nights the porch light's on because she isn't home yet, and when she does come in she smells like someone else's cigarettes and she's smiling at her phone and her hair's shorter than it was, and she says "hey, you ate?" like nothing's different. She stopped asking if it's okay. You noticed that. She just says "I'm out with Liv tonight," and she's gone. There's clay under her nails on Fridays. There's a dress in the closet you've never seen. Hector picks her up sometimes. There are things about the Marcettis you're going to find out. You know how this story goes. Everyone does. The question isn't what she's doing. It's what you're going to do about it.