When there’s finally a break in our conversation, Terrance stands.
“I think I better head up,” he says, stretching his arms above his head. “Start to unpack, get some gear out. Set up a bit. Don’t mind me.”
Gear? What for? Do you have a lot of gear?
“No, not too much. Nothing you have to worry about. Just a few essentials to help with data collection and stuff.”
“I’ll show you your room,” says Hen.
“Oh, Junior, here. Don’t forget to take two of these.”
He holds up a translucent pill bottle, shakes it.
“Here,” he says. “Doctor’s orders.”
What are these? Painkillers?
“They should help,” he says. “Yes.”
My shoulder does hurt, but in a vague way. I hold my hand out and he tips two blue capsules into my palm.
They each take a couple of bags that Terrance had already carried in from the car and head upstairs. I get up very slowly, still feeling stiff and tender. I know I’m supposed to move around a bit. After all, it’s not my legs that are injured. I clear the table. Without putting too much pressure on my bad shoulder, I attempt to wash the dirty dishes stacked beside the sink. The caked-on egg yolk is the hardest to get off. As long as I don’t extend my arm, as long as I keep it anchored against my side, the pain isn’t bad.
There’s a strange man upstairs with my wife while I’m down here, washing dishes with one arm. But what can I do? How should I react? Just go along with everything, try to be passive and agreeable? Or should I be putting up more resistance against this whole process? Demanding more answers?
I hear Hen walking around upstairs, above me. I know it’s her by her steps. The pace. The weight. It’s amazing the ways we know someone after living with them as long as Hen and I have lived together. The time we’ve spent together: it’s significant. I’ll miss hearing those gentle steps when I’m gone. Hearing her steps is like hearing her talk; it’s as recognizable as her voice.
Walking is nonverbal communication. Like I can tell if Hen’s mad by her footsteps. Walking isn’t as overt as other signals, like the way someone smells, their voice, their laugh, their facial expressions. Steps can be frivolous, but they’re often distinct from person to person. Familiarity grows over time, slowly, inadvertently. I never tried to get to know her walk deliberately. This stuff happens unwittingly.
Terrance isn’t married. I don’t know if he understands marriage or how committed relationships function. You can’t really understand a relationship until you live it, unless you’re in it. That’s part of what made everything so exciting for Hen and me. We were starting out together, we’d committed to each other, but we still didn’t know all those small details about each other at first.
Living with someone can’t be simulated or rehearsed. It has to be experienced, in real time. There is no substitute for shared involvement, for creating actual memories. Like, I know how Hen blows her nose. I’ve never thought about it until now, but I do. I know the cadence, the rhythm. She does it in the same tempo every time.
These observations—her footsteps, how she blows her nose—they’re like little secrets.
I’ll miss her steps, and the way she blows her nose. I wonder what else I’ll miss. I wonder what she privately knows about me that I might not even know about myself. What will she miss about me when I’m gone?
I hear a door open, more walking above me. Hen’s laugh. I can tell it’s sincere. She has a fake laugh, and a real one, like everyone. That’s something else I’ve grown to recognize. This laugh is real.
I’ve known him for a few years now, been aware of him, but when I stop to think about it, I still don’t know much about Terrance. I’m not only referring to his personality and nature, but all the ways he exists, both consciously and involuntarily. This is the stuff that requires time. Time together. I don’t know how he walks through a house at night or what he thinks about as he tries to fall asleep.
I know where he works. I’m familiar with his face. I recognize his voice. I know his smile. That’s about it. That’s not a lot. Those details are all aspects he can control to shape my perception. But now he’s here, living with us, in our house, eating our food, using our bathroom, sleeping in our guest bed. Watching me, us.
What does he really want? Just to observe? To talk to me? Or something else?
She laughs again, harder this time. He must have said something funny. He doesn’t strike me as a funny guy. I can’t hear what they’re saying. I set the last dish from the sink into the drying rack and run my hands through the soapy water, ensuring there’s no cutlery left in the bottom. I lift the plug, letting the water drain out.
I can’t believe everything that’s happened since these plates were dirtied. It makes me feel like a different person. It’s not just today, the last few weeks. It’s incorporating the addition of new experiences and information, fitting it in to what my life was before Terrance showed up that night more than two years ago, when I first saw those green headlights at the end of the lane.
Our house is the same old house. I look at my dripping, soapy hands. The same hands I’ve always had. All is the same, all is unchanged, but as of today, right now, everything feels completely different.
Hen appears at the kitchen door, then comes up beside me. “He’s getting settled,” she says.
I’ve been thinking, I say. It’s not an optimal situation, but we really have to try. We have to make the best of this. We’ll get through it. He shouldn’t be here too long. Then it’ll just be us again. For a while. Before I go, I mean. Did he say yet how long he’d be here?
“Until Friday.”
Okay. At least it’s just him, and not a bunch of them. One stranger, no matter how nice he pretends to be, is plenty for me.
I sling the tea towel over my sore shoulder.
Do you think he’s nice?
“He is what he is.”
Do you consider him a stranger?
“I wouldn’t say that, not at this point.”
Really? I say. Think about it. He is.
I lean closer, lower my voice.
We don’t know him. Not really. It’s just that whenever we see him, something significant has happened. There’s big news and revelations. So it feels like we know him better than we do.
“I don’t feel like I know him well,” she says. “That’s not what I’m saying. I just don’t think he’s a complete stranger. I know him better than I know a lot of people. But never mind. You’re entitled to your opinion.”
I put a hand on her shoulder.
You feeling okay?
“Yeah,” she says. “I’m tired.”
Feels like he’s been here forever, doesn’t it? I say. Months, even. Honestly, I feel like my internal clock has been all messed up. Maybe it’s the accident. What were you guys talking about up there?
“When?”
When I was doing the dishes just now.
“You shouldn’t be doing the dishes. Your shoulder.”
What were you guys talking about?
“I can’t remember. I was showing him his room, then I was in our room. Nothing specific. Why?”
Is Terrance funny?
“Like, is he a funny guy?”
Yeah.
“I don’t know. Do you get that feeling? That he’s funny?”
No, just wondering. You’ve talked to him more than I have, that’s all.
“I’m sure he’d tell you a joke if that’s what you’re wanting.”
I’m sure he would, I say. If that’s what I wanted.
She pauses, looks at me, then turns to leave.
Wait, I say.
She stops.
Does it seem weird to you that I was found out in that field? That the doctor got here so fast?
“Not really,” she says, turning toward me. “Clearly OuterMore has a vested interest in keeping you healthy.”
They were there before I was, before whatever happened to me. I wonder if . . . I wonder if maybe they were following me, I say.
“I thought you said you don’t remember anything.”
I don’t. But I . . . I don’t know. Maybe I remember a little. Someone stopped me from getting to that barn fire. Someone knocked me down.
“You hit your head when you fell. I’m not surprised you’re confused.” She reaches a hand out to me, touches my wrist. It feels good, her touch—calming.
Thanks, I say. You know how to make me feel better. Recently it’s been hard for me, hard not to feel weird and unsure about things.
“Junior?”
What?
“I’m going to say something, okay?” I feel her hand squeeze my wrist harder. “I know you so well. I really do. Things have changed over the course of our relationship. We’ve both changed. You probably feel the same about me. Change in relationships is normal. But, even as things changed for us, after we got married and moved here, I still feel like I know you so well. I know you better than ever. I think that’s part of the problem. When you start a relationship, you just have to go all in, and it’s based on a mix of hope and belief that you do know who you’re marrying and what it’s going to be like. But you can’t really know how it will work out. Not until you live it. At some point the hope turns into constancy and comprehension and then repetition. It’s so . . . severe. The predictability of everything we’ve done. It’s become the new truth for us. Which for me isn’t comforting. It’s the opposite.”
I’m about to reply when she releases her hand and raises it to stop me. She doesn’t want to hear what I have to say.
“I want to talk now. And I want you to listen. You have these traits, a way of being that’s fundamental to you, and it can be exhausting. I wonder if that’s just an inherent part of who you are or if it’s part of us in this relationship. And maybe I shouldn’t be sensitive about this, or even wonder if it’s unique to our relationship. I know you think you’re being nice when you say that you don’t know what you’d be without me, but I feel like I’m not here only to help you feel secure in your life, or to offer you support so you can then do whatever it is you want to do. I don’t know if you understand any of this, but I’ve been thinking about this for a long time. Sometimes I feel drained. Sometimes I feel trapped.”
She’s serious about this. It’s in her eyes, her voice, everything. She sounds tired again. I should listen to what she’s saying. I know things haven’t always been perfect between us, but I don’t like that I’ve caused this distress. It’s not good. I feel bad.
I’m sorry if I’ve—
“Stop,” she says. “Don’t apologize, please. That’s not what I want from you. You’re listening to me, and that’s a help. I’ve never felt like I could bring this up. Even that, the fact I don’t want to bring this up, is upsetting to me. But I’m glad I have now.”
Hey, why don’t you play the piano tonight. Maybe that will help.
I don’t know where it comes from, this idea. But I know it’s good when she plays.
She blinks, sighs. “I hadn’t really thought about it.”
I think it seems appropriate. I think you’ll feel better.
She turns and leaves.
I stay where I am. She doesn’t say anything else. It takes a few minutes for Hen to get down to the cellar, take the cover off, and start playing her song.