After My Mother Died, I Stopped Begging My Husband

Matteo got home while I was in the bathroom working my wedding ring off. It was stuck at the base of my finger. I worked some hand soap around it and pulled, hissing at the sting. He asked through the door why I was still up. I rinsed the ring and left it on the sink. He was in the bedroom doorway, thumbing through his phone, the tail end of a smile still on his face. He didn't kill the screen until I got close. "Good, you're up. Come with me tomorrow night—I've got a few people to see." He tugged his tie loose. "Vivian'll handle your dress." I told him I wasn't going, and put the papers in front of him. His hands stopped on the tie. He read the first line. "I want a divorce," I said. "Is this the thirty grand again?" He frowned. When I didn't answer, he tossed the papers to the foot of the bed. "You already got it, didn't you?" "It came too late." I watched the pages fan out. One slid off the bed onto the carpet. "Naomi, what more do you want from me? She was doing her job, and you went down to the office to corner her. Now you've got the money and you're still not satisfied?" He'd swatted my phone away at the office exactly like that—never even glanced at the screen. I crouched and gathered the pages back onto the bed. "Take your time with those. I'm packed." That was when he clocked the canvas bag by the door. I'd carried it in college; the strap had faded almost white. A maid had boxed it up on our wedding day, and I'd never managed to throw it out. Matteo walked over and opened it. Two old tops, a pair of jeans, sneakers with the soles patched. He laughed. "You don't have to punish yourself to make a point. You've got clothes filling half the rooms upstairs." I took the bag back and went to the dressing room. Old code, then my fingerprint. The lock stayed red. I stepped aside so he could watch it not open for himself. "They changed it last month. Vivian said if anything went missing it'd be a nightmare to figure out who took it. Now I have to give her a heads-up before I can get my own clothes." He frowned at the panel, but it still didn't seem to register as a problem. "It's just so the jewelry doesn't walk off." "Remember the black dress last week? You said I showed up late and dressed wrong for the room. That was the only thing I could get. She told me I'd put the wrong end time on the request form, so I had to file it all over again." "You should've just come to me." He was running out of patience, like that closed the subject. I pulled up the call log from that night and held it up. Six calls. He hadn't picked up once. All I got was a voicemail. I played it right there. His voice filled the bedroom. "Naomi, all this over a dress? Just do what Vivian tells you." He pressed his lips together and said nothing. My hand was still a little unsteady when I lowered the phone. I'd spent so long rehearsing how to lay the whole thing out for him. And now, one item in, I was too worn down to bother with the rest. "Fine. I'll have her give you the code." He reached for me, his voice finally going soft. "And I'll put twenty grand a month in your account. Buy whatever you want." I stepped out from under his hand, zipped the bag, and picked up my coat. His face closed off. He told me not to push my luck—but he kept watching me, like he was waiting for me to name a number. At the door he called after me one more time. "Think this through. You walk out, I'm not coming after you. Nobody out there is going to take care of you the way I do." My shoelace was knotted. I picked at it twice before it gave. His last line landed and my hand just stopped. The ring had left a red groove in my finger. Three hours earlier the funeral director had asked for a second next-of-kin number. I'd scrolled my whole contact list before I said mine would do. "You won't have to come after me." I finished with my shoes and carried the bag into the elevator. The doors slid shut on him standing there, tie hanging, mostly just irritated. He didn't know yet. The thing he'd been holding over me was already gone.