Lie to Me

Her laptop was on her desk.

Her cellphone was in the charger.

Her purse was on the floor next to her chair.

Her wallet inside, the smiling DMV photo that made her look like a model.

Like a zombie, he moved back to the kitchen. He opened
the refrigerator and got out the milk. Poured cereal in the bowl. Dropped the stevia into his tea. Sat at the empty table, stared at the spot where his wife’s head should have been.

What was he supposed to do now? Where could she be?
He ran through the possibilities, the places she loved,
discarding one after another. Surely he was wrong in his
thinking. Surely she’d simply run away, to one of her
friends. That’s where she’d gone. Should he call Ivy and see if Sutton was camped in her kitchen, instead of his? Should he give her some time, and space, like she asked?

She left without her things, Ethan. Sutton’s lifelines are her laptop and phone. It’s her office, her world.

A dawning realization. Sutton hadn’t shaken the depression, not completely. She was still prone to fits of melancholy. She might have done something stupid, crazy. She’d tried once before, after... Oh, God. Her words. Perhaps she was telling him exactly what she’d done.

I’m a coward. Forgive me. Don’t look for me.

He threw the bowl of cereal across the room.

“Bloody fucking hell. You selfish, heartless bitch.”