I twisted the handle and gave the door an energetic push powered by guilt. The door slammed into softness - there was a cry and the sound of a fall. She had been right behind the door. I was afraid to push it open any further. I put my mouth to the opening.

"Donna? Are you all right?"

"You a.s.shole," she said. A few seconds ticked by; I stared dumbly at the door jamb.

"I"m sorry," I said finally. "I didn"t know you were right behind the door."

She didn"t answer. I peered inside. She was squatting on the floor, holding a carpet brush in one hand; from time to time, she wobbled a little and steadied herself with the end of the brush. I saw she was still wearing her official high heels; she must have thrown herself onto that mud of mine the moment she"d walked in.

"May I come in?" There was an exaggerated, exasperated sigh. I gingerly pushed the door open wider and stepped right onto the rubber mat by the wall, feeling like a helicopter pilot setting down atop a skysc.r.a.per. I took off my boots and my jacket, waiting for her to say something. She watched me silently from down below, most likely waiting for the same thing.

"I"m sorry," I said again.

"You"d better be." There was a pause. "Couldn"t you have at least cleaned up what you"d brought in?"

"I intended to," I said. "But I felt really rough after last night and thought I"d manage to have a short walk first, and then tidy up before you came back."

"Yeah, last night. That"s another story." Donna stood up slowly, dropping the brush on the floor. She walked to the kitchen, wobbling on her high heels. I looked down at the brush; a dustpan sprinkled with dark sand lay by the door. There was only one thing to do.

The mud had completely dried out, crumbling away under the brush; there were faint yellowish stains left here and there, but they would probably come off under a wet sponge. I brushed away, squatting, kneeling, and finally sitting on the floor. I ventured into the kitchen once to empty the dustpan. Donna was standing by the window, apparently waiting for the coffee maker to do its business, smoking one of her very rare cigarettes – a thin toy tube of tobacco called More; approximately a third of it was cellulose filter.

I had to squat down next to Donna in order to put away the dustpan and the brush in their designated and officially approved place. I shoved them in and hesitated. Donna"s legs were maybe six inches from my face. She wore her official office pantyhose, a silvery grey, which went well with all of the half dozen or so of her official suits. I felt an impulse to reach out, to run my hand along that beautiful, shiny leg. A year earlier, I would have. Now, it seemed the wrong thing to do.

"Coffee?" asked Donna.

"Yes," I said, straightening up.

The teaspoon clanked a couple of times, and she handed me my mug. It really is my very own mug; I bought it at a garage sale when I was still a student. It has a Scots grenadier painted on one side, and a French fusilier on the other – I"d leafed through a couple of books in a bookstore to establish these ident.i.ties. If you hold it in your right hand, you see the Scot, skirt and all; if you hold it in the left, you see the fusilier. Both are charging away from the handle, spiky bayonets atop the raised muskets, destined to meet, but never making it around the bend...

Donna always showed a slight distaste for this mug, and bought me one decorated with cartoony, happy cows in a field of flowers. I dropped it one nervous morning and it broke. She thought I"d done it on purpose. I told her it was an accident. She wasn"t convinced, although she pretended to believe me. Donna has this talent for finding hidden motives, the rotten seeds that germinate into monstrosities. I suspect that"s yet another way in which she gets those cheated wives to settle easily. She seeks out and tunes into all the ugliness they feel, the rage and the hate, and she lets them know that she knows. They instantly feel guilty and settle for less, an act of n.o.bility to convince themselves they aren"t really that bad.

"We have to have a talk," said Donna.

I became very interested in my coffee. It was bitter. Donna thinks sugar and salt are death in disguise.

"I lost my job," I said.

"I know you did. You told me a hundred times, last night."

I thought about it for a little while. I couldn"t remember talking to Donna upon getting home, but then I couldn"t remember getting home either.

"I was pretty drunk last night," I said cautiously.

"You were stinking drunk. But somehow, what you said made quite a lot of sense."

I wished fervently I could remember something I"d said, especially since it reportedly had been so wise.

"Look," I said, "Why don"t we forget last night and have that talk as if last night didn"t take place. I was p.i.s.sed and unhappy."

"I have no intention of forgetting last night," said Donna. There was a pause. "But you seem to have."

There was no use trying to outfox her. She was too smart. That was one of the things which initially attracted me to her. It"s odd how often the very things that attract one to another person become the things one fears or detests, after a while.

"I"ll refresh your memory," said Donna the lawyer. "You came in drunk, told me about the job, and that you don"t have a s...o...b..ll"s chance in h.e.l.l of finding another one. I asked you what induced you to spin that fantastic lie about a nonexistent daughter. Then you called me a cold-hearted b.i.t.c.h that"s only interested in money. I asked you if you wanted children, Oscar, both before and after we got married. You never said you did."

I called her a cold-hearted b.i.t.c.h that was only interested in money? That was news. I didn"t even think that way. Or did I?

It happens sometimes that someone spits out a ridiculous accusation like that, an accusation that can"t be proved or disproved – how does one prove one never thought something? – and, having initially recoiled with horror and denial, you realize it"s true. I looked at Donna, smartly efficient in her business suit. She was eyeing me coldly; there wasn"t a trace of sympathy visible on her face. Things had definitely changed since, since oh G.o.d, since a f.u.c.king long time ago.

"I didn"t want a daughter," I said. I cleared my throat. "We. We didn"t want children. Not right away," I said.

"That"s correct. We didn"t. We talked about it. I thought we had an agreement."

"We did have an agreement," I said. "That thing at the office was just a stupid joke that got out of hand." I took a reluctant sip of the coffee. It was still very bitter.

"Some joke." I shrugged and looked at the floor.

"Oscar," said Donna, after a pause. "The past year, we"ve been seeming to drift further and further apart. Don"t you think so?"

"We"ve both been very busy."
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"We"ve always been very busy. But it didn"t seem to matter, previously. Do you realize we haven"t made love for nearly four months now?"

Now that was a dirty blow. We stopped making love because I thought, I felt Donna wasn"t so crazy about it any more. She never initiated anything; that was always up to me, and lately, okay, for some time now, there was this reluctance... Donna never refused me. There were no not-tonight-I"ve-headache situations. But I could sense the reluctance, and became reluctant too. Add the fact that after a while things become too familiar to be truly exciting, and you"ve got the picture.

"Oscar, are you having an affair?" I nearly dropped my favourite mug. I prophylactically set it down on the counter; some coffee slopped over the rim.

"Wait a sec," I said. Then I did something incredibly foolish. I went to the hallway and got the anonymous letter from the inside pocket of my jacket. I returned to the kitchen and handed Donna the envelope without a word. I picked up my mug and sipped my coffee, heard the whisper of that mostly blank sheet of paper being pulled out –

"You believe this." It was a statement, not a question.

"Should I?" I asked. I didn"t look at her.

She didn"t answer. I heard the rustle of paper being folded back inside the envelope, a soft slap as the envelope landed on the kitchen counter, then the click of Donna"s heels as she walked out, leaving me alone.