3: 3
I lowered my head numbly and pulled out my phone.
Noreen really had messaged me over two hours ago, a long errand list laid out one item after another.
At the time, I'd been asking a friend in the medical field to look into her so-called amnesia at the hospital where she worked.
He'd told me flatly that no such illness existed in medicine.
And even if it did, the treatment would never be a bone marrow transplant.
"I didn't see it," I said quietly.
Noreen's face darkened at once. "You didn't see it?"
"Is your phone just for show? Everyone's sitting here starving, waiting on you half the day, and all you've got is 'I didn't see it'? Is there anything you can actually do right?"
Right on cue, Merlin clutched his chest and looked ready to faint.
Noreen spun to him in a panic. "Merl, what's wrong?"
He spoke weakly. "It's nothing... I probably just haven't eaten in too long. A little low blood sugar..."
Her expression tightened. She hurried to the cupboard and yanked out the box on the top shelf.
It was the cured ham my father had mailed from home. I'd been saving it, never able to bring myself to eat it.
"Don't touch that, please," I said without thinking.
"That's from my dad. There are crackers in my bag—"
"What do I care about your specialty ham?" She frowned and glared at me. "You couldn't be bothered to bring food back, so what happens if Merl passes out from low blood sugar? People die from that!"
She tore the box open, sliced the ham, and carried it over to Merlin.
I stood where I was and watched her.
People die from low blood sugar?
So she did know it could kill.
Back when I was pulling nonstop days to hit a project deadline, sleeping less than ten hours across three days,
when I woke at dawn shaking and cold-sweating from a bad drop in blood sugar and begged her to bring me a piece of candy,
what was she doing then?
Her amnesia had flared up again.
She'd looked at me half-asleep. "What did you just say?"
I watched the gift box torn to pieces while they grinned and passed around the ham my father had sent.
Merlin gave me an embarrassed look. "Des, don't be mad. My blood sugar really did crash, I wasn't trying to eat your stuff on purpose... I'll buy you a box to make up for it."
Noreen patted his head. "Don't bother explaining to him. He's got a mind as small as a pinpoint."
Her friends chimed right in. "Exactly. Desmond, you're a grown man, aren't you being too petty? A box of ham's not worth anything. And it doesn't even taste good."
"Merl's not feeling well and you, his big brother, don't show the slightest bit of concern."
"Nor, get your husband under control. That long face he's pulling is bad luck to look at."
Noreen couldn't keep face any longer. She cleared her throat.
"All right, all right. He's been busy at work lately, short-tempered. Don't hold it against him."
"Everyone hang on a little longer, I'll take him out for food and we'll pick this back up when we're home."
She dragged me toward the door before I could get a word in.
My lower back ached, and I stumbled from the pain, but she yanked me roughly out the door anyway.
Noreen jerked the wheel hard as she drove, scolding me the whole time.
"Desmond, are you trying to make me lose face on purpose?"
"Merl and the others only came over to help treat my illness. Would running one errand actually kill you?"
"Those are my friends. You married me, and you can't even bring yourself to host them?"
I didn't say anything.
She was really immersed in this game of hers.
I knew why she was angry.
In that circle, Noreen ranked at the bottom.
Merlin was its center: good family, good looks, everyone orbiting him.
The others each had their own backing too.
Only Noreen had tagged along since childhood, used to being the one on the fringe who kept the mood up.
Deep down she was insecure.
And to please them, to prove she was somebody too, the only way she could feel she mattered was by pushing me around.
She was showing them: look, my husband does whatever I say, I ask and he obeys. At home I'm the absolute queen.
"Say something! Have you gone mute?" Noreen snapped, out of patience when I stayed silent. "What were you off doing earlier?"
I drew a breath. "I went to the hospital today."
She cut me off. "It's just chest tightness, isn't it?"
"Could you stop being so delicate? Merl has premature heartbeats and he's not carrying on like it's the end of the world the way you do."
I looked at her. "You remember?"
She froze for a second, realizing what had slipped out.
But she still put up a front. "Yeah, that's just how my condition is. And what's wrong with remembering? Remembering means it's getting better."
I said nothing more and only lowered my head.
The day Merlin went in to have his heart checked was my birthday.
She'd forgotten it clean and spent a whole day and night with him.
When she got home, she looked at me with that apologetic expression again and said she didn't remember.
I followed silently behind her and we bought the food together.
At a roadside stand, she went out of her way to buy me a grilled sausage, the kind I'd liked back in college, and said,
"There, don't be angry anymore."
"This sausage is just for you. The others don't get any."
Hearing that, I felt how bitterly ironic it was.
This was probably the only shred of tenderness she had left for me, or for this marriage.
I pushed the door open to a living room hazy with smoke and beer cans knocked over across the floor.
The moment Aria saw us, she started clamoring.
"Ugh, just drinking is boring. We want homemade dumplings!"
Noreen laughed. "No problem. Des'll make them for you."
She turned to me. "Go on. Make a few kinds of filling. Merl likes shrimp, so make a separate batch just for him."
I walked into the kitchen without a word.
I was already run-down, and I hadn't eaten all day.
Every muscle in my body ached faintly, and cold sweat kept beading up.
I forced myself to cut the vegetables. My vision went black,
and the blade sliced open my index finger, blood welling up in an instant.
