8. Theo
THEO
The house was dark when I pulled into the driveway. Just the light over the front door, the one Lena always left on when I worked late. I killed the engine and sat there for a second, my hand still on the keys.
The ring in my pocket felt heavier than it should.
I got out and walked to the door. Unlocked it. Stepped inside.
"Lena?"
My voice bounced off the walls and came back to me. Nothing else. I closed the door behind me and stood in the entryway, listening. The house had that particular quality of silence that meant nobody was home, the kind you could feel in your chest before you heard it. Or didn't hear it.
"Lena?" I called again, louder this time.
Still nothing.
I walked through the downstairs, flipping on lights as I went.
The living room was empty, the leather furniture sitting exactly where it always sat, untouched.
The coffee table with its reclaimed wood.
The abstract art on the walls. Everything in place, everything expensive.
I crossed to the windows and looked out at the street, half-expecting to see her car pulling up.
Nothing. Just the streetlights and the empty driveway.
The kitchen was clean. Counters wiped down, nothing out.
I checked the sink — empty. No dishes, no glass, no sign anyone had eaten here tonight.
The dish towel was folded over the oven handle, the way Lena always left it.
The salt and pepper shakers were centered on the counter.
Even the fruit bowl was arranged, apples and pears in a neat pile.
I opened the refrigerator without knowing why. Milk, eggs, vegetables in the crisper drawer, leftovers from something I didn't recognize. I closed it again. The hum of the compressor filled the silence, louder than it should have been.
The dining table caught my eye. No place settings. The chairs sat empty around it, the chandelier throwing its usual uneven light. I walked closer, ran my hand along the back of one of the chairs. The wood was smooth and cold. I'd eaten at this table maybe three times in the past year. Maybe less.
She wasn't downstairs.
I took the stairs two at a time, my heart kicking up for reasons I couldn't name.
Each step creaked under my weight, sounds I heard every day but never paid attention to.
Now they were too loud. Something about the house wasn't right.
Not empty the way it was when Lena was out running errands or at the restaurant.
Empty in a way that made my chest tight.
The bedroom door was open. I hit the light switch and the room came into focus: the expensive furniture the decorator had chosen, the dresser by the wall, the bed we'd shared for twelve years, made and untouched. The pillows were arranged the way Lena always arranged them.
"Lena?"
God, I sounded desperate. Like an idiot calling for someone who clearly wasn't there.
I cleared my throat and walked to the bathroom anyway, flipped on the light.
The marble countertop was clean, her toothbrush gone from the holder by the sink.
I opened the cabinet underneath — her face wash was missing.
The little toiletry bag she kept there, gone.
I straightened up and caught my reflection in the mirror. I looked like hell. Tie loosened, jacket wrinkled from the drive, hair going in three directions. I looked away.
The closet next to the bathroom was empty, same as always. I pulled the door open anyway and stared at the empty shelves.
I came back out and stood in the middle of the bedroom, turning in a slow circle. The chairs by the window, upholstered in grey fabric. The abstract paintings on the walls, geometric shapes in muted colors. The dresser.
The wardrobe.
I crossed to it and pulled the doors open. Her side was on the left, same as it had been since we moved in. I knew that division without thinking about it, the way you know which side of the bed is yours in the dark.
Her clothes were gone.
Not all of them. The black dress she'd worn to one of my openings was still there, hanging in its garment bag.
A grey cashmere sweater I remembered buying her for Christmas three years ago.
Some blouses I didn't recognize, silk or something close to it, colors she never wore. The tags were still on those too.
But the everyday things, the ones she actually wore — her jeans, her cardigans, the sneakers she kept on the floor of the wardrobe, the comfortable clothes I saw her in when I was home long enough to see her at all — those were gone.
I stood there staring at the empty space, my throat going tight.
My hand reached out and touched one of the hangers, pushed it to the side.
It scraped along the rod with a sound that made my jaw clench.
Another empty hanger. Another. I pushed through them, counting without meaning to, trying to remember how many things had been there yesterday, last week, this morning.
I couldn't remember. I should have been able to remember.
The things she'd left behind were things I'd bought her. The things she'd taken were hers.
I turned my attention to my side of the wardrobe.
My shirts hung in their usual order, the sequence I'd kept without thinking about it for years.
Whites together, then blues, then the darker colors.
The charcoal button-down was there. The navy one with the thin white stripe.
But between them was a gap, a space where something should've been.
I ran my hand along the hanging shirts, counting them without meaning to.
The dark green henley was missing, the one with the worn collar and the pulled thread near the left shoulder seam.
I'd meant to get rid of it a dozen times because it looked like shit on camera, but I'd kept it because it was comfortable.
Why the hell would Lena take one of my shirts?
I closed the wardrobe and turned around. My hands were shaking. I looked at them, at the way my fingers wouldn't stay still, and shoved them in my pockets. The ring was there, small and hard against my palm. Her ring. The one she'd left at the restaurant.
The dresser caught my eye. There was something on top of it, a folded piece of paper I hadn't noticed when I first came in.
I walked over and picked it up.
It was a menu. Hand-written, the paper worn soft at the edges and creased down the middle from being folded so long. The paper felt thin between my fingers. I opened it carefully.
Lena's handwriting. Younger and rounder than it was now, the letters careful and even—handwriting I hadn't seen in years. The categories were in capitals, underlined twice: STARTERS. MAINS. DESSERTS.
Under each heading she'd listed dishes we'd talked about, things we'd planned together back when we were just starting out.
Roasted beet salad with goat cheese and candied walnuts.
Pan-seared salmon with lemon butter and asparagus.
Chocolate torte with raspberry coulis. A little fork and knife were sketched in the corner, the lines wobbly like she'd drawn them freehand at the kitchen table, probably laughing while she did it.
There was a faint coffee stain in one corner, brown and ancient.
I knew what this was. We'd made it together at our old apartment, the one with the kitchen barely big enough for two people to stand in.
The night we stayed up too late planning my first restaurant, drinking cheap coffee because it was all we could afford and talking about everything we were going to do.
Lena had written the whole thing out by hand because we didn't have a computer that worked, and I'd kept it in my office for years after the restaurant opened.
I thought I'd lost it. Figured it had gotten thrown out in one of the moves.
She must've found it. And then she'd left it here, where I'd see it.
My chest felt tight. I folded the menu back along its crease and slipped it into my jacket pocket next to the ring.
My phone was in my other pocket. I pulled it out and called her number. It rang once. Twice. Three times. Four. Then her voicemail picked up, her voice coming through warm and familiar, asking me to leave a message.
I hung up and called again. Same thing. Four rings, voicemail, her voice asking for something I couldn't give her.
On the third try I left a message.
"Lena, it's me. I'm home. Where are you?" My voice came out rougher than I meant it to. I cleared my throat. "Just . . . call me back. Please."
I hung up and stood there holding the phone, waiting for it to buzz. Ten seconds. Twenty. Thirty. Nothing.
The bedroom felt too big. I turned and walked out, went back downstairs.
The kitchen was exactly as I'd left it, but now I noticed things I'd missed. The table had a single place setting at the end nearest the window. One plate, one fork, one knife, one glass. The napkin folded beside it.
Like she'd set it for me, the way she used to when we first got married and I'd come home late from the restaurant. When I'd promised I'd be home by eight and didn't make it until ten, and she'd still set a place for me anyway.
I pulled out the chair and sat down. The wood creaked under my weight. I put my phone on the table, screen up, and stared at it. Willing it to ring. The seconds ticked by and the screen stayed dark.
I reached into my jacket and pulled out the menu again. Unfolded it, smoothed it flat on the table. The paper was soft under my fingers, worn thin at the creases. I read through the dishes one by one. She'd dotted the i's with little circles back then, something she didn't do anymore.
Roasted beet salad with goat cheese and candied walnuts. I remembered her saying that, remembered sitting across from her in our old apartment with the notebook between us and her telling me beets would work, trust her. I'd trusted her.
Pan-seared salmon with lemon butter and asparagus. That one had been mine. She'd written it down in her careful handwriting like my idea was worth preserving that way, like it mattered.
Chocolate torte with raspberry coulis. We'd spent two hours that night going back and forth on the desserts. I couldn't remember the argument anymore, just that she'd won it, and I'd been happy to let her.
The little fork and knife in the corner looked like a child had drawn them.
The lines were uneven, one tine longer than the others.
She must have been laughing when she did it.
I could almost see her sitting at that table, bent over the paper, trying to make the sketch look professional and failing.
My chest hurt.
I folded the menu and set it down on the table, smoothing the crease with my thumb. My hand was shaking. I pulled it back and shoved it in my pocket.
My phone sat beside the menu, silent.
I checked the screen again. No messages. No missed calls. I opened my texts and scrolled to Lena's name. The last message was from me, three days ago: Running late. Don't wait up.
She hadn't answered then either. I scrolled up. Two weeks ago: Stuck at the taping. Be home late. Before that: Meeting ran over.
I stared at the screen. The messages sat there in a column, one after another, all of them from me. All of them the same.
I put the phone down and sat back in the chair. The house was so quiet I could hear the refrigerator humming in the corner, the faint tick of the clock on the wall. I'd been in this kitchen a thousand times and I'd never noticed how loud the silence was.
She'd left her ring at Adriatico. She'd packed her things and gone. She'd set a table and walked away from it. She'd left this menu where I'd find it, this thing we'd made together back when we were just two people with a dream and no money.
And I didn't know why.
No, that wasn't true. I knew something was wrong.
I'd known it the second I saw the ring sitting on that table at Adriatico, small and deliberate, like she'd set it down on purpose and wanted me to find it.
I'd felt it in my chest when I walked into the house tonight and heard nothing back.
I knew something large had happened, something that was about me, something I'd done or hadn't done.
I just didn't know what.
I pulled the ring out of my pocket and set it on the table next to the menu.
Plain gold, smooth all the way around, no stones.
The engraving inside said Always. I'd had it put there because I'd meant it.
I'd stood in front of a crowd and put this ring on her finger and promised her always, and I'd meant every goddamn word.
I still meant it.
But Lena had taken it off.
My phone buzzed and I grabbed it so fast I nearly knocked it off the table. A notification. Email. Some automated update from one of the restaurant systems. I stared at it, my heart pounding stupidly in my chest, and then I set the phone back down.
She wasn't going to call.
I sat there for another ten minutes, maybe longer, waiting for something I couldn't name. The phone didn't ring. The house stayed quiet. The place setting across from me stayed empty.
She wasn't coming back.
Finally I stood up. My knees cracked. I pocketed the ring and the menu, picked up my phone and my keys. I didn't know where Lena had gone, but I knew someone who would.
Maggie's place was twenty minutes across town, in the neighborhood where Lena had grown up.
I locked the door behind me, left the light on over the entrance, and got in my car.
The dread followed me the whole way there.