Chapter 4

Morris had never made me breakfast.

I looked at the milk and the butter melting over the pancakes. Morris knew I was lactose intolerant. He still poured milk into my coffee if I didn’t stop him.

“Enjoy it while it’s hot,” I told Cassandra.

I went to the bathroom, closed the door, and ran cold water over my hands until I could trust myself to come back out.

Two days later, they left for Finland. I’d just come home from meeting the lawyer Gordon had recommended when I saw the new post on Morris’s blog.

One last indulgence. Let me love you one more time.

There was no photo. I read the line twice. Then I closed the page and blocked the account.

The lawyer had drafted the divorce agreement, set out how we’d divide our assets, and marked the pages I’d need for the pack registrar. A yellow tab stuck out beside the place where Morris was supposed to sign.

I emailed him the agreement. He didn’t reply.

Over the next three days, I packed a suitcase with what I’d need right away. My assistant arranged to ship my books and work files to the overseas office. I donated the rest of what I didn’t plan to take.

I kept finding things I’d bought in pairs. Two mugs from our first winter together. Two key rings from a shop near the clinic. I’d had to ask Morris three times before he took his out of the box. It still looked new when I dropped it in the trash.

I tore up our photographs last. In one of them, taken not long after we met, he was looking down at the table while I laughed at something outside the frame. It reminded me of the night I told him I liked him. He’d gone red all the way to his ears and spent so long looking anywhere but at me that I’d started to think I’d have to take it back.

“Y-yeah,” he’d said. Then he’d cleared his throat. “I mean, yes. I’d like that, Regina.”

I laughed out loud in the empty apartment. I could still hear the way he’d stumbled over it.

For years, whenever I wondered whether he loved me, I went back to that moment. I’d thought he was too shy to say what he felt. Then I saw what he wrote when he had something he wanted to say.

I tore the photograph in half.

By the time my car was due, there was one suitcase by the door. I stood beside it and called Morris.

Someone picked up on the second ring.

“Morris, did you check the file I sent?”

“He’s busy, Regina. I’ll tell him to call you back.”

Cassandra. She sounded nothing like the woman who’d called Morris saying she felt too weak to get dressed.

“Just tell him to open the file,” I said. “It’s urgent.”

A pause. Then she gave a little sigh.

“You still don’t get it, do you? I’m the one he loves. It must’ve been hard, spending three years with a man who never wanted you the way he wanted me.”

“I’d rather be in my shoes than yours, Cassandra.”

She went quiet.

“Morris doesn’t know why you really came back. Do you think I don’t know?”

“Regina…”

“I’m staying out of whatever you two have going on. Don’t give me a reason to change my mind.”

I hung up and went downstairs. The driver put my suitcase in the trunk and asked which terminal. It felt good to answer a question that simple.

I was waiting to board when Morris finally texted me.

Regina Swanson, what did you say to Cassandra?

A second message came through before I’d finished reading the first.

Fine. I lied. Cassandra and I are together. If you’re angry, take it out on me. What does she have to do with it?

Then came the part I read twice.

When we get back, you’ll apologize to her. Then we can put this behind us.

I laughed. The woman ahead of me glanced over her shoulder. He’d ignored the agreement for days. Cassandra had gotten him to send three messages in the time it took me to get to the airport.

I typed my reply.

Morris, I want a divorce.

I emailed you the agreement. Sign it and send it back.

The line moved. I switched off my phone and took hold of my suitcase.

For three years, I’d kept my name beside his in the pack’s household register. I’d let him decide which dinners could wait, which promises counted, and when I was allowed to be hurt.

At the gate, the agent checked my passport and handed it back to me.

“Have a good flight, Ms. Swanson.”

“Thank you,” I said, and walked on.